The search continues for the Canadian Forces private who was last seen early Saturday morning.

“We are focused on finding him and we’re still very hopeful of a positive outcome,” Capt. Kimberley Lemaire, public affairs officer for Canadian Forces Base Kingston, said Tuesday morning.

The Ontario Provincial Police’s underwater search and recovery dive team has been called in to assist with the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service’s investigation, OPP spokesperson Bill Dickson confirmed. They arrived at about 1 p.m. on Tuesday.

Pte. Michal Beaman, originally from Saint John, N.B., has been in Kingston since early January to train at the Canadian Forces School of Communications and Electronics. On Friday night, he went out with course mates and took a taxi to The Spot nightclub in the Hub. That is the last place he was seen by them just before midnight. He had told them that he’d be leaving with a woman, his aunt Tracy Brewer said on Monday.

At the time, he was wearing blue jeans, a grey hoodie, a black jacket and red shoes. He is a five-foot-eight white male with brown hair and eyes.

When he did not return to barracks Saturday morning, course mates told their chain of command, who in turn notified the Military Police. When he did not return by Sunday evening, the Canadian Forces National Investigation Service called Beaman’s parents in Saint John.

They drove through the night and arrived in Kingston early Monday morning. They’ve been housed by the school, its commandant, Lt.-Col. Walter Gamblin, said.

Brewer said surveillance footage from the club showed Beaman leave with a woman, them talking outside for a few minutes before she threw up her arms and walked back inside. He did not follow her.

Tips led the investigation to the Warming and Counselling Centre on Wellington Street, where police learned Beaman stayed for a while talking to the homeless. He did not have any money and asked how to get back to CFB Kingston.

Brewer has been posting updates on the search for her nephew on her Facebook page on behalf of herself and her sister, Beaman’s mother. She explains on the page that investigators are following Beaman’s movements early Saturday morning using surveillance footage.

She posted Monday evening that Beaman was captured by surveillance cameras crossing the LaSalle Causeway on Highway 2, heading toward CFB Kingston, but stopped to look at the Royal Military College’s Memorial Arch for about 10 minutes. In the footage, it appears Beaman had lost his coat, she said.

The Memorial Arch is roughly a 3.5-kilometre walk from the centre of the School for Communications and Electronics. The school is located south of Highway 2 on the most eastern area of the base. The two common routes to the school would either be taking Highway 2 straight to the entrance of the school, or turning right off Highway 2 toward Fort Henry and walking through military housing along Lundy’s Lane. Both are a similar distance.

Lemaire said that while the public will likely see members of the military out searching, they will be where leads in the investigation have taken them. Kingston Police’s unmanned aerial vehicle is also being used in the investigation.

“We’ll be searching where we feel it can be the most effective,” Lemaire said.

She said that while they search for Beaman, they will be limiting their updates on the CFNIS investigation to the public.

Anyone with information about Beaman’s whereabouts is asked to call the Military Police at 613-541-5010, ext. 2044.

“Mickey, we really need to find you today!” Brewer posted on her Facebook page. “There are hundreds of people looking for you, and hundreds more praying for your safe return, to them I can’t say thank you enough.

“I just can’t imagine what happened, you were out having a good time being your fun-loving self and BAMB! You’re gone. We love you so much!”

scrosier@postmedia.com

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