VANCOUVER ISLAND, B.C.—On Canada’s remote western coast, the 48-foot Astral Blue tugs gently at her moorings, floating a few hundred metres from the only road out of Ucluelet, B.C.

It’s been a month since her two-man crew sailed up from Panama, tied her to the harbour dock, and stepped ashore after eight weeks at sea.

Dan Archbald and Ryan Daley spent three days in town. Then on a cloudy afternoon, they walked up the harbour gangplank, hefted bulky sea bags over their shoulders and vanished.

That same day, some 235 kilometres away, a work van belonging to Ben Kilmer was found abandoned on a rural road near Duncan, B.C. Its engine was running and there was blood inside.

Police say they consider Daley and Archbald’s disappearance suspicious, but not Kilmer’s.

They also say the cases are not linked, but that hasn’t stopped a fire of speculation from spreading across the island.

The question everyone is trying to answer: how did three men around the same age go missing on the same day?

After a month with no answers, friends and family in both cases now suspect foul play.

Panama to Ucluelet

Daley, 43, and Archbald, 37, and a father of two, are friends from Squamish, both of them accomplished sailors.

Their last-known sighting was in the harbour parking lot. Carrying large bags and looking nonchalant, they crossed through a security camera’s field of view and haven’t been heard from since.

Friends and family say they were planning to find a ride to Jordan River, where Daley owns property. They never made it.

Sitting in his office within arm’s reach of where Daley and Archbald were last seen, Kevin Cortes is the last known person to speak with the pair. The conversation was nothing special, Cortes said.

“No different than it would be with any of my other customers,” he said. “A little bit of superficial talk but nothing of any specifics.”

Friends and family say Archbald bought the Astral Blue in Ecuador two years ago. The pair sailed her to Panama in October to avoid paying steep moorage fees over the winter, according to Daley’s sister-in-law Lindsey Youell.

The friends planned to retrieve the vessel this spring and sail home together. When they arrived in Ucluelet, the only port on the island’s west coast with a call-in station for reporting to the Canada Borders Services Agency, everything appeared normal, Cortes said.

After clearing customs, Archbald wanted to get the boat reappraised, Cortes said, to try to reduce the import tax they’d have to pay for bringing it into Canada.

“CBSA gave them a blue book value on the boat he thought was high,” Cortes said. “I hooked him up with a marine surveyor out of Port Alberni who came down and did his thing.”

Two weeks ago, the RCMP searched the vessel stem to stern. Witnesses at the harbour said they used police dogs and forensics teams.

Despite multiple requests, the RCMP did not answer any of the Star’s questions about either of these cases.

The Astral Blue appears in good shape, save for a string of gouges along the starboard gunwale. Don Kimura, the marine surveyor who inspected the vessel, said Archbald told him the damage happened during a storm while on their journey home.

It was one of the only times during the trip that Youell’s brother-in-law checked in with the family. The pair had just arrived in Hawaii, Youell said, and Daley called to say that, despite the heavy seas, they were OK.

Kimura couldn’t give the exact value of the craft for professional reasons, but said comparable vessels are worth about $100,000. He said the boat is properly registered and his interactions with Archbald were “normal.”

The only road out of Ucluelet winds its way through a rainforest. Dense vegetation covers the forest floor. Mossy fallen trees and broken limbs obstruct anything trying to make its way through.

Aside from nearby Tofino, it’s more than an hour’s drive to the next town, Port Alberni. Youell said when the men first went missing, the family combed the forest along the highway for days.

The search turned up an article of clothing and a pill bottle near Ucluelet, but Youell said no one recognized either item. A month after the two disappeared, both families are beginning to fear the worst.

“He’s gone,” Youell said of Daley. “We know him, we know that if he had wanted to go into hiding or run away or something, he would have gotten some sort of message to us.”

Lean into the waves

An air horn shatters the Saturday morning calm throughout a forest in the Cowichan Valley last week, stopping a search party in its tracks.

Thirteen people are strung out in a line running 150 metres through the bush. Most of them know Ben Kilmer, an electrician and father of two from the Duncan area. Some of them do not, but came from across Vancouver Island to help search for him. Spaced barely 20 metres apart the forest is so dense they can hardly see each other.

On top of a ridge, at the north end of the line, Kilmer’s wife, Tonya, hollers directions to those trying to find any sign of her husband.

“Cover your ears, everybody blow!” she yells, unleashing a barrage of air horns and whistles.

Everyone freezes, careful not to rustle so much as a leaf that could drown out any sound of response. None comes.

“Proceed!” Tonya yells, and they head forward again.

As hard as the past month has been for Tonya, she refuses to give up the search for her husband.

“For me, I just sometimes break down when I’m alone, when I have the time to let those emotions just wash over me,” she said.

When it happens, she leans into the waves, Tonya said, so she can get through them and back to the task at hand.

“It keeps me focused and driven,” she said. “Now is not the time to grieve. Now is the time for action. It is desperate.”

Like Archbald and Daley, Kilmer was last seen on May 16. A security camera picked him up with the van at a job site about 10:30 a.m. His van was found later that day near the intersection of Menzies Rd. and Cowichan Lake Rd., west of Duncan.

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In the days after Kilmer’s disappearance, the ground search for him centred on the area where his van was found. While police and provincial search and rescue teams have moved on to other leads, the area is still being searched with dog teams by experts from the non-profit Search and Rescue Society of B.C.

Meanwhile, the volunteer ground search has shifted to the Skutz Falls area in Cowichan River Provincial Park, and where it will now remain.

The area holds special meaning for Tonya and Ben. It’s amid this lush greenery and chirping birds they first met, and where she believes he might have returned if he were hurt.

But that’s not the only reason the search teams are here.

“I’ve been told there’s a number of clues that have lead to this spot. That’s why we’re organizing here now,” said a professional tracker, who asked that his name not be used.

The searchers are a large group but the hunt is not without its risks. Like most wild places on the island, there are bears in the area, the tracker says. Tonya was charged by one early in the search while hiking far from the main group, a reminder that the search parties are safer together.

Then there are the grow ops. Before setting out, the tracker cautions the group against straying onto any private property for fear of stumbling across one.

Searching along the ridgetop with Tonya and the others is Ross Morrison. He’s known Kilmer since they were in Grade 9.

“We always camped together, I went to his wedding,” Morrison said. “We have a really tight-knit group of friends that have been friends probably since high school.”

Kilmer didn’t have any enemies, no reason to leave everything behind and wouldn’t have “disappeared himself” either, Morrison said.

Three weeks after his friend was last seen, Morrison has come to his own conclusion.

“Seems like foul play to me,” he said. “He’s the type of person that if someone was struggling on the side of the road he would have pulled over to help.”

Multiple missing persons cases unusual

The Kilmer search has shared some information with the families of Archbald and Daley. There are no known links between the cases, but at this point they’re not ruling anything out.

“We’re not all knowing,” Tonya said. “There could be some unknown connection the families are not aware of, but it’s certainly not in any friendship circles.”

Missing persons expert Sasha Reid said the disappearances have occurred against the backdrop of some other cases on the island.

“I don’t like coincidences,” she said. “I don’t really believe in coincidences too much.”

Reid is a developmental psychology PhD candidate at the University of Toronto. She said, from looking at her data, there is a “concerning” number of other men missing on Vancouver Island, and the cases merit a closer look.

In November 2017, 31-year-old Brandon Cairney was declared missing from Port Alberni after failing to show up for an appointment in town. According to police reports, Cairney has a brain injury, and is known to frequently walk the Alberni Valley roads alone.

Daniel MacDonnell was last seen June 20, 2017, after returning to the Port Alberni area from Eastern Canada. According to police reports, MacDonnell’s father said his son planned to work on fishing vessels in either Port Alberni or Ucluelet.

Together with Kilmer, Archbald and Daley, that makes five men in the space of a year who all vanished on southern Vancouver Island.

Plea for information

Back at Skutz Falls, the ground search for Kilmer goes on for hours as the volunteers step over logs, have their feet sucked into bogs and endure swarms of bugs.

Despite the weeks that have passed, Tonya still clings to the hope that Ben will be found alive.

“I know it. I feel it in every fibre of my body,” she says. “He has this incredible will to survive.”

Right now the most pressing need is for more search volunteers, Tonya said, to help scour the park for any trace of Ben.

Last weekend’s search may have uncovered one.

After two days searching the Skutz Falls area, Tonya said they found footprints that could belong to Ben. They’re working to compare them with the boots he was likely wearing the day he went missing, and have trackers following the trail.

They’ve told the RCMP about the lead, but will continue chasing it themselves. They don’t want to distract from the larger police investigation, Tonya said.

While Tonya tries to stay positive, she’s also starting to wrestle with a reality that her mind reels from.

Even if there is foul play at hand, she says she’s not interested in vengeance or laying blame. She just wants to know where her husband is.

“We need him,” she said, between sobs. “We’re desperate, and he needs us. Whatever wrongdoing might be involved, I will forgive. Please don’t stay silent.”

Correction - June 20, 2018: This article was edited from a previous version that misstated the ages of Ryan Daley and Dan Archbald. As well, the article mistakenly said Daley has two children.

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