American couple renowned for finding drowning victims arrives in Vernon to search for missing kayaker

A retired husband and wife from Idaho who are renowned for finding the bodies of drowning victims when no one else can have arrived in Vernon to search for the body of Eli Buruca.

The 26-year-old went kayaking with friends on Kalamalka Lake the evening of July 24th and got separated from the group during a sudden storm. His kayak washed ashore, but Buruca remains missing and is presumed drowned.

“He was so young and so many things he wanted to do, now he won’t get to,” said Eli’s sister Nidia Buruca Majano, who has been staying in Vernon during the search for her brother. The siblings were born and raised in Vancouver and moved to Calgary several years ago. Eli was working a construction job in Vernon this spring and summer.

“Given how long it’s taking to find him, it hasn’t sunk in for me fully I would say. It’s been really hard on my parents. But we have been really lucky we had a support system throughout,” said Nidia. “We have family in Vancouver and Surrey who came out to be with us.”

When RCMP and search and rescue crews couldn’t locate Eli’s body, Nidia reached out to Gene and Sandy Ralston, an Idaho couple who are spending their retirement years travelling the US and Canada with their boat and high-tech sonar equipment, searching for drowning victims at the bottom of lakes.

“So they agreed to come up,” said Nidia. “We are very grateful. We have no other resources, no other options. We are not experts in any of this, we are doing what we can. So this is amazing that they agreed to come out and they’re going to help us.”

She said the Ralstons are the family’s last hope for finding Eli’s body. “They have the sonar, it’s a special sonar device that covers a wide area that does a big sweeping motion is my understanding, and they’re experts in being able to analyze the imaging,” she said.

Eli Buruca is pictured.

The couple has successfully located bodies of drowning victims in B.C. lakes several times in the past decade.

“They are a volunteer couple, but they do need their travel, fuel, their stay covered,” said Nidia. So the family has started a GoFundme to raise money to reimburse the Ralstons, and to bring Eli’s body back home if it can be recovered from Kalamalka Lake.

“Two years ago we also had our older brother pass away, and we want to do the same thing we did for him for Eli. So we want to have a service in Vancouver, and then have him buried next to my older brother in El Salvador,” said Nidia

The family also hopes the tragedy serves as a warning to other kayakers who, like Eli, don’t always wear a life jacket.

“He was a little too brave I think. I wish he would have, I would have insisted he wore it. You never know, right? And here we are with the never know,” said Nidia.

“You would never get in your car and start driving away without clicking in your seatbelt, so why are we are we getting on watercraft without clicking on our PFD or lifejacket?” said Kimiko Harakida with the Life Saving Society of B.C. and Yukon.

“It’s so important to realize that the weather can change very quickly, the wind can pick up, and in a small craft such as a kayak, you can be instantly carried out to a deep part of the lake that you’re not necessarily comfortable swimming in,” said Harakida. “Wearing a life jacket or PFD can make all of the difference.”

In this case, not wearing one likely cost a beloved brother and son his life.