CAMBRIDGE BAY, NUNAVUT—RCMP officers in Nunavut had to jump into action this week when a child who was on a daycare outing fell into a crevice.

Mounties say a boy vanished Monday during an afternoon of sledding on a popular hill about seven kilometres outside Cambridge Bay, and was found minutes later in a snow crack three to 4 1/2 metres deep.

An off-duty officer who was with the group called for backup as the preschooler was too far down to reach.

Three other officers arrived, but an attempt to lower one of them into the crevice failed.

Everyone started digging and, after several attempts, two officers were able to crawl in head first and pull the child to safety.

The boy, who had been in the crevice for about half an hour, was cold but not injured.

“One of the members was talking to the child throughout,” Cpl. Dmitri Malakhov, media liaison for the RCMP in Nunavut, said when reached by phone Friday.

“The child was obviously upset and crying, but luckily he was unhurt.”

Cambridge Bay is a community on the southeast corner of Victoria Island in the Arctic archipelago. It is a popular stop for passenger and research vessels traversing the Northwest Passage.