Search expanded for missing B.C. fishermen

Foghas becomethe latest enemy in the effort to find four sport fishermen missing since Mondayoff the northwest tip of Vancouver Island.

Search planes and coast guard ships are scouring a huge area south and west of Winter Harbour but visibility is poor,making it difficult to spot the six-metre open aluminum sport fishing boat, Victoria Rescue Co-ordination Centre spokesman Gerry Pash said Wednesday afternoon.

The search, which was expanded earlier Wednesday,remains a rescue effort, Pash said, but conditions have deteriorated since the boat was last seen, and its occupantsthree guests of the Qualicum River Fishing Lodge at Winter Harbour and a fishing guide are not equipped with survival suits.

Earlier in the day, officials were a bit more optimistic.

"We are still hopeful that the occupants are with the vessel and perhaps adrift with mechanical difficulties, that type of thing,so we are hopeful,"Paul Tasker of the Rescue Co-ordination Centre.

Not everyone shared Tasker's optimism.

"In the 10 years I've been here, this is the worst June and July I've ever seen terrible northwesterlies," saidWayne Ridley, who faced one of those northwesterlies on Monday, the day theboat went missing.

Ridley said he was nervous when he departed on Monday, despite the calm weather.

"I was very reluctant that day to go down there," Ridley said, "because the weather report said that it was going to come up in the afternoon, and one thing they are is pretty accurate."

When the winds came up, Ridley said, hemade for home, bucking a two-metre sea the entire way back.

"With the weather conditions and the swells that Iencountered, anything could have happened," Ridley said.

"Icome home at eight miles an hour, that's how rough it was, and normally we can do about 18 or 20."