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The Coast Guard has stopped searching for a missing 55-year-old man suspected of falling off a pier in Kaka, Alaska.
In a written statement emailed early Friday morning to Navy Times, Cmdr. Byron Hayes, the Coast Guard Sector Juneau search and rescue mission coordinator, said it was a difficult decision.
"Suspending a search is one of the hardest decisions we make in the Coast Guard,” he said. "The decision is made with great care and deliberation, and with heavy hearts for the family and friends of the missing man.”
A family member of Reginald Skeek Jr. notified the Coast Guard at 7:55 a.m. on Thursday that he had been missing since Wednesday.
Alaska State Troopers in Ketchikan had received a report late Wednesday from a Skeek relative that the Kake man had not been seen since around 3:30 p.m. local time.
Alaska State Troopers, Kake residents, Village Public Safety Officers and even a remotely-controlled underwater drone joined in the hunt while a Coast Guard Air Station Sitka MH-60 Jayhawk rescue helicopter scanned the shoreline and surrounding waters, officials said.
They held out hope because the weather afforded light wings, good visibility, relatively languid seas and a water temperature of 55 degrees, but he was never spotted.
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On Thursday, the Alaska State Troopers reported that Skeek was last seen at a village liquor store on Wednesday.
Troopers pulled surveillance footage and it appeared to show a person behind the Kake Liquor Store falling off of a dock into the water around 1 p.m. Wednesday local time.
With a population of only about 600 people, the Kupreanof Island hamlet of Kake is about 95 miles southwest of Juneau.
Prine came to Navy Times after stints at the San Diego Union-Tribune and Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. He served in the Marine Corps and the Pennsylvania Army National Guard. His awards include the Joseph Galloway Award for Distinguished Reporting on the military, a first prize from Investigative Reporters & Editors and the Combat Infantryman Badge.
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