The search for a missing preschooler is being scaled back after police concede the boy is likely dead after wandering away from an outback homestead.
August, known as Gus, went missing from his family’s sheep station in the remote South Australian mid-north on Saturday afternoon.
The only trace found of the four-year-old was a tiny footprint in the dirt about 500 metres from the family homestead, despite an extensive search involving police, Defence Force personnel and large numbers of volunteers.
“Whilst we’ve all been hoping for a miracle, that miracle has not eventuated,” SA Police Assistant Commissioner Ian Parrott told reporters on Friday.
“This is clearly now what appears to be a very tragic set of circumstances.”
No significant evidence was found to allow emergency services to focus the direction of the search, with police earlier admitting the footprint could have been a week old.
“We’re confident that we’ve done absolutely everything we can to locate Gus within the search area, but despite our best efforts, we have not been able to locate him, and unfortunately, we are now having to scale back this search,” Mr Parrott said.
Police would continue investigating the boy’s disappearance, including the possibility he might not have got lost while playing outside the property, near Yunta about 300km north of Adelaide.
“But everything that we have found to date, every piece of information and evidence that we have explored to date, indicates that … Gus has wandered off from this property and we’ve not been able to locate him,” Mr Parrott said
Senior police had spoken to Gus’s family and told them he was unlikely to still be alive, based on expert advice about the outback weather conditions and clothing he was wearing when he disappeared, he said.
The preschooler’s distraught family spoke earlier in the week, saying they were “struggling to comprehend what has happened” to the youngster.
The adventurous boy had been playing in the sand near the family homestead when he disappeared.
Gus has long, blond, curly hair and was last seen wearing a grey sun hat, a blue T-shirt with a yellow minion on the front, light grey long pants and boots.
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