Missing B.D.F. sergeant found safe and sound

Thousands of Belizeans prayed for the safety of Sgt. Ramon Aguilar after the soldier was reported missing during a training exercise in the Chiquibul Forest Reserve. For nine days, more than two hundred of his colleagues and other officials combed the dense jungle in coordinated air and land search and rescue efforts. And even as the hours ticked by, Aguilar’s family and friends never gave up hope that their loved one was alive. So when word came on Saturday that the young father was safe and sound, the nation let out a collective sigh of relief. News Five’s Kendra Griffith has the details of Aguilar’s emotional homecoming.

Kendra Griffith, Reporting
It seems the entire Aguilar family turned out at the Belize Defence Force Air Wing to welcome their loved one home.

Paulina Ramsey, Sister
?The whole family is happy to know that he is back home and waiting to see him right now. We are so anxious, you know. We just want to see him, nothing else, we don?t want to hear nothing else; we just want to see him, that?s all we want to do, just see him.?

And then came the moment they were waiting for …

Lorna Aguilar, Wife
?It feels so great, I can?t explain the joy I feel so happy. I noh wah let ah go no more again. I wah just hold ah, I noh wah let ah go no more, no more.?

Juvencia Aguilar, Mother
?I feel so good, I feel so good. This was a time that I went through that I noh know how I still stand up. But thanks the good Lord and everybody who give us full support.?

Kendra Griffith
?Where were you when you got the call??

Juvencia Aguilar
?I was at home sitting down. Well first thing I did was elevate. That was the first thing I did and thanked the Lord for his return. But in here I knew he was alive. I knew it.?

Sgt. Aguilar says he knew that after a couple days his family would have been concerned.

Sgt. Ramon Aguilar, Missing 9 days
?Well after three, four days I know it would be a concern, especially nine days in the jungle. I noh worry about anything noh cause I am well trained, so definitely I would have survived.?

Kendra Griffith
?How did you feel then, when you realised you were lost??

Ramon Aguilar
?Well normal, I had to survive. I built myself a little night thing and rest up. Hoping that the next day I would continue, but it wasn?t like that because everywhere I turned it was the same.?

Kendra Griffith
?How did you eventually find your way back or how did they find you??

Ramon Aguilar
?What happen, I came down?everywhere I move I end up a stream. North, south, east west, I found a stream. But the biggest stream I decide to walk down because that was going down, I said I guess that will take me to the Macal River noh, so I decide to walk that this morning.?

Kendra Griffith
?Then what happened??

Ramon Aguilar
?About six o?clock I decide to walk that stream. I walked, walked. From there I met a normal track that goes east and I decide to take that track going east. I walked for like four hours east until I met a wider track, where I saw some boot prints, figured it was either B.D.F. or the Xateros, decided to follow that and that?s when I heard voices and I met up to the patrol.?

Second in Command of the search and rescue was Major David Jones. He said he got the call about Aguilar?s discovery about three Saturday afternoon.

Major David Jones, Second in command of rescue
?As soon I got the information that they had found him, I checked to find out if he was in good spirits, he was in good health. They said he was relatively okay, a bit dehydrated, so they cooked some food for him on ground, get him to eat something and then he said he was fine. He was able to walk again to come out to the area. I then sent in another patrol for security reasons to go and get him and then bring him back to the headquarters where I was.?

Kendra Griffith
?How far off course was he??

David Jones
?When we actually find him he was only six kilometres away, which is about four, four and a half miles or so from where the headquarters was. That area that we found him, we had searched that area before, so he wasn?t there all the time. He had been wandering for miles around the area until he eventually got to that track and that is how we were able to get him, since we had patrols all out in that area. So eventually we knew we were going to get him because we had patrols out. It was just a matter of time to get him there.?

… time that could not have come soon enough for his family.

Paulina Ramsey
?I thank God because lot of prayers gone up for ah. And we thank the B.D.F. for the best of what they did to bring ah in back and we mi hope that by this weekend we would get an answer. And our prayers were answered.?

After a brief reunion with his family, Aguilar was taken over to Price Barracks where he received a medical check-up and was allowed to go home and sleep in his bed.

As the saying goes, what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger. For Belize Defence Force Sgt. Ramon Aguilar, spending nine days alone in the bush armed with only instincts and a machete has given him a certificate of completion for one heck of a survival course. This morning Aguilar, flanked by his commanding officers, held a press conference at Price Barracks where he provided the media with all the gritty details of his unforgettable experience in the jungles of Belize.

Ramon Aguilar
?When I took off from Las Cuevas, I went due west, roughly approximately seven hundred metres was my first checkpoint, which was checkpoint three. Upon going to that checkpoint, somewhere along the way I lose my map without recognising. When I did stop to do a map check, I hadn?t any map, so I decide I cannot go forward without a map, the only way to go was the way I know I came from. So I decide to take a backtrack east. Upon going east I met on one of the sergeants that was on the course, Sergeant Cal. He said he was going to the same checkpoint that I was going. I told him, well I lose my map, I have no other map, so I am going back into base camp.?

?I got up six o?clock the morning, kit up and I continued northeast. I walked for approximately four hours navigating northeast, but to no avail. So I decide to go back south and that is where I met a stream. I continued walk the stream up stream for another four hours until I reach a high hill; that was about Friday evening. I met the hill, a nice open areas where they have an open space I can see the sky, so I decide to stay there Friday, Saturday and Sunday night, hoping that the chopper or the plane will saw me sometime. So I stayed there Friday, Saturday and Sunday night. Monday morning I saw, you know what no chopper no plane, I deh pan mi own. But I didn?t give up hope, because I know they were searching.?

A search so intense it seemed more like a manhunt.

Gen. Lloyd Gillett, Commander, B.D.F.
?We spared no resources in searching for Sgt. Aguilar. At one point we had over three hundred and twenty-five officers involved in the search on the ground and on the air. We also got the Guatemalan armed forces and the Guatemalan national police involved in the search on their side of the border.?

According to second in command of the search, Major David Jones, the soldiers detained a suspected xatero on Monday and questioned him to find out if he?s heard about Aguilar, but he had not. The land and air patrols then continued in all directions around the area where Aguilar was last seen. When they started having no luck later on in the week, the search began to intensify and the soldiers started to wonder if Aguilar had been kidnapped.

David Jones
?If anyone had him, they probably had him detained because we were saturating the area. All the tracks going west we were covering, so we set ambushes in the area because the modus operandi of the xateros is that they do their work in the day, however, they would normally take their xate out in the night. So we had the patrols laying in waiting in the nights, twenty-four hours a day, monitoring those tracks that led over to Guatemala.?

And while his colleagues searched, Aguilar was doing his best to survive in a less than welcoming environment. Because it was a short exercise, all Aguilar had on him was only a compass, whistle, machete, and small webbing pouch with a water bottle. With no rations, food became a priority.

Ramon Aguilar
?For that whole nine days, everything I met, once it walks it is dead. The snakes that we call the jumping tommy goff, usually when you meet one like that you try avoid it, I glad when I saw one, that was a meal for me for the day. So during that whole nine days I always ensure I stay by a stream, because tosurvive out there you need, one: shelter, two: food, and three you need water. They are the three basic necessities out there, so I always try to stay by the stream and any?they have some little shells, I don?t know if you know them, they call them Jutes, very nourishing. I ensure I eat at least fifteen of those for the day along with the little crabs and the frogs. Once spell I eat two frog legs, I had to cut off the legs and that?s what I ate for the whole nine days.?

?The condition of the area, it was rainy so no sunlight, so I remained wet day and night, but I was strong and as I mentioned earlier, the training that the B.D.F. give, I had to put into practice and with that manage to find my way out. The last place I slept was the first place I got lost. I said to myself, I got lost from here, I came in from here and I had to get out from here. So I went back, that was Friday night, I went back to the last place I got lost where I harboured the first night.?

When he woke up that Saturday morning, Aguilar continued his trek and eventually came upon a search team in the area.

Aguilar said that his family and the knowledge that his fellow soldiers would find him is what helped him through his ordeal.

Ramon Aguilar
?For the nights I was out there all alone I think of nothing else but my family and my comrades that are behind me hundred percent. I know they wouldn?t have given up on me, so I didn?t give up on myself either. And because of that I am still out here and I am alive and I would like to say finally thanks to the general and all the soldiers that did not give up on me. I know that they would have continued search for me, even if it was my bone they find, they would have find some part to prove that they did their part and I must thank them.?

But beyond receiving thanks, the B.D.F. must now figure out how to avoid such incidents in the future.

Lloyd Gillett
?The court of inquiry will determine what other measures we need to put in place. And I don?t want to prejudge what they will come up with, but basically he didn?t have his weapon with him, so maybe that is one thing that always needs to be with him. The location where the training was being done provided other hazards, so maybe the individual map reading training can be done somewhere there are more specific boundaries to the area, so that if they get lost they will eventually find a boundary marker. And also the response, when people were notified, when we expanded the search, all of those things. This is standard for any training incident that occurs.?

And it seems that Aguilar is not going to let a little thing like getting lost for nine days stop him from returning to his jungle training. He says he?s even got his wife?s blessing.

Ramon Aguilar
?The commander has given me permission, I will continue the course because that is what we are here for: meet the objective and carry on. Also as the colonel has told me, based on my nine nights experience, I am a well qualified instructor to do the survival phase of this course. She realise that this is my career and if I have to leave no and tell her I have to go, she will feel it, but she will understand that yes, you have a job to do; do your job. I spoke to her concerning that and she agreed, fully agreed and she?just that she told me, not to lose my map this time.?

Sgt. Aguilar leaves for the jungle once again on Tuesday.

Kendra Griffith reporting for News Five.

This morning force medical officer Dr. Irving Gabourel, reported that for someone who had spent nine days in the jungle, Aguilar was in good health. Besides losing a few pounds, a couple insect bites and sore feet from hours of trekking, there was nothing wrong with him physically or mentally.