33 year old BDF sergeant Ramon Aguilar has been missing since October fourth and tonight his family is gravely concerned for his safety. The veteran soldier disappeared last Wednesday near the Las Cuevas Research Station. The BDF says he was finishing up a training exercise when he realized he had lost him map. He went back into Chiquibul to recover the map but has not been seen since. Today his wife told us that she doesn't think the father of their two children is lost, she fears worse than that.
Jules Vasquez Reporting,
This is Sergeant Ramon Aguilar. He's a 13 year veteran of the BDF and is now a signals sergeant with the Logistics Company. He's highly trained, earning this certificate for his international training. He left home on the 26th September, going on jungle training in the Chiquibul Forest Reserve. But he went missing on October fourth, almost one week ago in this same sprawling expanse that his distressed wife now combs on this map - tracing the track he usually followed, almost begging the paper for answers.
Lorna Aguilar, Wife of Missing Soldier
"My husband knows out there. It is not the first time he has gone out there. He has been out there. He has been on the job thirteen years now."
And she says he knows what to do when lost.
Lorna Aguilar,
"For instance when a BDF soldier went missing first, about three to four years back, when he came home he told me had to go out because a soldier is missing. He told me that if he was in that soldier's shoe, from the time you find out you come off track, you would sit down and wait for your team to find you faster."
But now those teams and other that have joined the search cannot find these experience soldier and his wife fears not that he lost but that he's been kidnapped by hostile forces.
Jules Vasquez,
Where do you think he is right now?
Lorna Aguilar,
"I don't know…maybe someone has him."
Jules Vasquez,
So in your mind, a professional soldier like Ramon wouldn't be lost for, we're going on to six days now?
Lorna Aguilar,
"No."
Jules Vasquez,
So in your mind he is not lost? You believe that he is being held by someone?
Lorna Aguilar,
"I think so because he wouldn't be wandering out there like that because he is a trained soldier. He wouldn't wander out there like that."
Juvencia Aguilar, Mother of Missing Soldier
"I feel that he is out there somewhere, maybe he got hurt and can't get up to really come out in the light. That is the way how I feel and I feel that the Good Lord will guide him and bring him home safely. That is all I ask for, that they bring him home safely, if whosever has him, if so be the case, let them let him go."
And now this mother and daughter in law are held hostage to the telephone that they keep always at hand.
Juvencia Aguilar,
"When the phone rings I just feel like we are going to hear something positive. I am not thinking negative, I am thinking positive."
Lorna Aguilar,
"At night time I don't sleep. I can't sleep. I can't sleep. Sometimes I just have the cell phone in the bed with me and I have the phone on the side of the pillow and I sit down and just wait because my husband was a loving person; we don't quarrel and we don't fight."
And now as she cherishes those fond memories, she says she just wants him back home.
Lorna Aguilar,
"I'd just want for the public out there to pray along with me that he comes home safe because me and my baby and his family needs him home."
Later on we'll tell you what BDF search parties are doing when we speak with Lt. Col. Reuel Black.
