VANCOUVER—Questions about how long two B.C. fugitives can survive the harsh northern Manitoba wilderness are beginning to swirl as the search enters its second week.

Police say the size and scope of their search for Kam McLeod, 19, and Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, is “pretty unprecedented.” Canadians have reported seeing the two in Dease Lake, B.C., Cold Lake, Alta., Meadow Lake, Sask., and Gillam, Man., where the trail went cold.

McLeod and Schmegelsky have been charged in the death of Vancouver man Leonard Dyck, are suspected in the double homicide of Australian Lucas Fowler and American Chynna Deese and have been on the run through some of the most inhospitable wilderness in Canada. Now the hunt is focused on the dense bush, forests and insect-infested bogs of northern Manitoba.

“We’re doing our best. We’re going through the due process and we’re being as safe as we can,” B.C. RCMP Cpl. Chris Manseau said Tuesday morning.

Investigators have received more than 260 tips in the last week alone, according to a tweet from Manitoba RCMP on Tuesday, and police have gone door-to-door, canvassing more than 500 homes in Fox Lake Cree Nation and Gillam. None of the tips have led police to determine whether the suspects have left the Gillam area, where they were spotted last week.

After a week without confirmed sightings, police say they are considering all possibilities, including that they inadvertently got help in leaving the Gillam area. Surviving undetected in the Manitoba bush, experts say, would be a challenge, but not an insurmountable one.

Read more:

Residents in small Manitoba towns living in fear as manhunt for suspected killers continues

Officials told to keep ‘mouths shut’ in B.C. hometown of suspected killers as manhunt continues

Manhunt expert: Police will try to get into the minds of suspected killers

“Seven days is nothing,” said Rob Allen, a long-time survival instructor based in Missouri. “You could sit under a tree next to a stream and drink water to survive.”

Allen said the forests and large animals in northern Manitoba offer plenty of opportunities to sustain two young men — one deer, he said, could yield enough meat for a month.

But McLeod and Schmegelsky also need to ensure they’re not seen, which Allen said means using fires sparingly so smoke doesn’t give away their location.

That’s assuming the pair have the tools and the skills to hunt, find water and build their own shelters.

“I doubt they have those abilities,” Allen said. “Most people who go on the run or involve themselves in nefarious things don’t tend to.”

One notable exception was Eric Matthew Frein, an American who managed to survive around the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania for 48 days after he shot and killed a state trooper in 2014.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

“Never doubt people, especially when they’re running away from life prison sentences, they can survive a long time,” Allen said.

Tim MacWelch, a survival expert based in Virginia, said the pair could survive “months” if they had shelter from the cold at night, a means to boil water, and basic hunting, fishing or trapping skills.

“People die from all kinds of stupid stuff, but usually it’s hypothermia, some kind of physical injury,” MacWelch said. “After that dehydration, starvation, various types of diseases.”

Depending on the tools they have available, McLeod and Schmegelsky could also be exposed to insect bites and even predators.

“If they’re trying to camp out with no protection from large predatory animals they might be in a bear’s belly now, that’s why no one can find them,” MacWelch said.

He added that their chances of survival would also be much better if they had a friend or ally helping them by delivering supplies.

The search for McLeod and Schmegelsky was expanded Monday to York Landing, a tiny community located about a four-hour drive west of Gillam, after police received a tip that people matching their descriptions were seen in the area. On Sunday, two volunteers with the Bear Clan Patrol, the Winnipeg-based Indigenous community-safety group, said they spotted the suspects at the dump in York Landing. Despite an “exhaustive search,” RCMP couldn’t substantiate the tip and on Tuesday morning, police said officers had left.

“The heavy police presence in York Landing has been withdrawn and policing resources in the community will return to normal,” RCMP Manitoba said in a tweet. “The RCMP thanks the community for their patience and understanding.”

“RCMP resources remain in the Gillam area and will continue to conduct searches in high probability areas for any signs of the suspects,” Manitoba RCMP said in a news release Tuesday. “The search of remote areas is being conducted both on foot and in the air.”

RCMP thought they were closing in on the suspects when they descended on Gillam, where there is just one road in and out of town. But no amount of troops, dogs, drones or helicopters could turn up a trace of the two fugitives, who are wanted on a Canada-wide warrant.

The lack of new information about McLeod and Schmegelsky has residents in both Manitoba communities holding their breath.

Early Tuesday morning, York Factory First Nation Chief Leroy Constant posted to his Facebook page that he would finally try to get some sleep after RCMP announced they had finished the search there.

“It’s been a very intense 24 hours in York Landing with very little sleep,” he wrote just after midnight on Tuesday. “We will be out and about tonight.”

Read more about: