PIERMONT – A search is resuming on the Connecticut River at this hour for a Vermont kayaker reported missing last night, after he departed for a paddle and an afternoon picking fiddlehead ferns.

Robert Swantak, 58, of Bradford, Vt., was last seen at 2 p.m. yesterday, when he left from a boat landing in Bradford on the Waits River, where it spills into the Connecticut River a few hundred yards downstream, according to New Hampshire Fish and Game Lt. Todd Bogardus.

Swantak’s upside down kayak, with a life preserver attached to it, was located last night on the Connecticut River in Orford. The location is several miles downstream from the confluence of the Connecticut and the Waits, Bogardus said.

ROBERT SWANTAK

There has been no sign of Swantak, he said.

Swantak, who is an experienced kayaker familiar with the Connecticut River, was reported missing to Vermont State Police about 7 p.m. yesterday and Fish and Game was notified around 9 p.m., Bogardus said.

New Hampshire has jurisdiction of the Connecticut River to the high water mark on the Vermont side.

Conservation officers were joined by personnel from the Vermont State Police and the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Service. A New Hampshire State Police helicopter was also on the scene last night.

The search, including the agencies from two states, is resuming this morning, both on land and in the river.

Bogardus described the Connecticut as running high at flood stage, “with a swift current and floating debris.”