On the afternoon of May 6, 2020, three-year-old Dylan Ehler was playing in his grandmother’s fenced backyard on Elizabeth Street in Truro, Nova Scotia. In the blink of an eye, the smiling toddler in dinosaur boots vanished. What followed was one of the largest search operations in the province’s history: ground teams, river rescue units, helicopters, drones, and hundreds of volunteers scoured the area for six agonizing days. The only trace ever found was a single heartbreaking discovery—Dylan’s little rubber boots, floating in Lepper Brook, the small stream that runs behind the property and feeds into the powerful Salmon River.

Despite exhaustive searches spanning miles of riverbank and forest, despite divers, cadaver dogs, and thermal imaging, Dylan was never found. No clothing, no body, no answers. In 2021, police officially classified the case as a tragic drowning, stating the swift current likely swept the child away. Yet for Dylan’s parents, Jason Ehler and Ashley Brown, closure remains impossible. The boots—those tiny, muddy boots—are the only physical reminder they have of their son.

Five years later, in May 2025, the pain has been brutally reopened. Another Nova Scotia family is living the same nightmare. Siblings Lilly Sullivan, 6, and Jack Sullivan, 4, vanished from a rural property near Lansdowne Station on May 2, 2025. Once again, search teams comb rivers and woods. Once again, a province holds its breath.

For Jason Ehler, every new missing-child alert is a fresh wound. “Every time I see another case, it’s like losing Dylan all over again,” he told reporters through tears. “I know what those parents are going through right now—the disbelief, the desperation, the endless ‘what ifs.’” He has become a reluctant voice for grieving families, pleading for stronger river safety measures, fencing requirements near waterways, and faster emergency responses in rural areas.

Nova Scotia has seen a disturbing pattern of young children disappearing near water. In the past decade alone, several toddlers have vanished in similar circumstances—many within minutes, many near small streams that swell dangerously after rain. Critics argue that provincial child-safety protocols around waterways remain dangerously lax, despite repeated tragedies.

Dylan’s parents continue to mark his birthdays and keep his memory alive on social media. A memorial garden now stands where his grandmother’s backyard once was. His boots, preserved by police, have become a symbol of every parent’s worst fear.

As the search for Lilly and Jack Sullivan stretches into weeks, Nova Scotia finds itself confronting the same haunting question it has asked since May 6, 2020: How many more children must disappear before something changes?

For Jason Ehler, the answer is painfully simple: “One was already too many.”