Maybe I'll start with the collaboration. We work very closely with other federal departments, as I think you're aware, for search and rescue. We work closely with the Canadian Forces as well. What I want to focus on is our work with Inuit specifically in the north.
We've made significant investments over the last few years to develop and expand our Coast Guard auxiliary, which are essentially volunteers across the country who participate formally in the search and rescue system.
In the north it looks a bit different than it does elsewhere in Canada, where it's typically leveraging people who are already on the water—fishers and others. In the north there are a lot fewer community boats, if you will.
We have also had a very successful program over the last few years where we've been able to provide funding to communities to procure a search and rescue vessel to become part of the Coast Guard auxiliary. We're very happy now to have 32 communities participating in this—46 vessels and over 430 volunteer—as part of our auxiliary in the north. This is a really great asset for search and rescue, especially when it comes to community-based search and rescue.
When you talk about some of the challenges, there are many in operating in the north. Right off the top of my head I'll start with the distance. The Canadian Arctic is huge. On the one hand, it's a small place where Inuit travel from community to community, and it is very well covered; but on the other hand, people don't necessarily appreciate that moving ships or assets from one part of the Arctic to another can take days at a time.
In addition to the distance, one of the challenges is the communication. In most of Canada we have what we call VHF radio, which essentially allows mariners on the water to communicate with the Coast Guard and our emergency services should they get into trouble. Outside a few pockets in the north, that doesn't exist.
What happens is that we respond to many missing hunter reports, where a community is expecting a group of hunters to come home on a specific day and they don't. Then they call us, and most of the time the hunters are fine. They have simply decided to delay their trip home, but they have no way of communicating with their home community, so the community will end up calling the search and rescue system. We deploy assets at a huge cost to the Government of Canada ultimately, and all of this, in theory, could have been avoided if there were communication. That's one challenge we see that's a bit unique to the north.
In addition, we have infrastructure and assets. Again, as much as we talk about the icebreakers—we have seven to nine operating in the north—when you look again at the vast geography, they aren't that much when you're talking about coverage for search and rescue. We have limited other supports. We have the auxiliary, which is really great and strong. In the rest of Canada, we have a layer of local search and rescue stations. In the Arctic, we have one Arctic marine response station in Rankin Inlet.
I'll stop there, but hopefully that gives you a bit of a sense of some of the challenges we deal with.