Updated: Sun Feb. 24 2008 9:25:39 PM

CTV.ca News Staff

Niagara Regional Police are searching for the identity of a man who was swept over the Canadian side of Niagara Falls Saturday afternoon.

Acting Staff Sgt. Dave Shennan of the Niagara Regional Police told CTV.ca Sunday evening that police do not expect the man to have survived.

"It would be a miracle," he said by phone, adding that police are not actively searching for any body.

The man was seen throwing a suitcase into the Upper Niagara River and then entering the water himself after it. He went towards Horseshoe Falls before being swept under the water by the current.

Shennan said that it could be a while before a body is recovered.

"The water is as deep as it high," Shennan said of the waters at the bottom of the falls. "Anybody entering the water, (as) cold as it is, the body is going to be pushed down to the bottom of the falls.

"It'll stay down there for a while."

Shennan said police are searching parking lots for abandoned cars and checking local hotels to determine who might have checked out Saturday.

"Because it's a border town we could have someone who was here from another country," he explained.

He said there were no local missing person reports. Shennan said that the man was not crying for help from the water.