Rescuers shift to recovery operation in search for missing 4-year-old boy

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Police have spoken with the family of a young boy missing in South Australia’s mid-north about transitioning from a search to a recovery effort. Four-year-old Gus, disappeared on Saturday from his family's remote sheep grazing station about 300km north of Adelaide

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00:00I'm here at Yunta, roughly three and a half hours northeast of Adelaide, which since

00:07Saturday night has been swarming with police and state emergency service crews working

00:12to locate four-year-old Gus, who went missing from his family's homestead, just 40 kilometres

00:17south of Yunta, off the barrier highway.

00:20Gus was, according to police, playing outside when around 5pm his grandmother went out to

00:25look for him and couldn't find any trace of him.

00:28The police have been working since then, day and night, to try and locate any signs of

00:32him.

00:33Now, up until today, we've heard that there have been no clues or any hints as to the direction

00:38in which he may have taken off in.

00:40That's changed today with the discovery of a bootprint roughly 500 metres from the family

00:46homestead.

00:47It appears to be a child-sized bootprint, with treads matching the sort of footwear that

00:51Gus would have been wearing, and that bootprint was located with the assistance of an Aboriginal

00:56tracker familiar with the territory.

00:58We also heard from SA Police Superintendent Mark Cyrus today that he's had discussions

01:04with the family to essentially prepare them for the possibility that this may be, at this

01:08stage, five days into the piece, a recovery effort rather than a rescue effort, given that

01:14Gus has most likely been without any food, water or shelter during that time.

01:19At the same time, Police Superintendent Cyrus did also qualify those remarks by saying

01:24that their police and rescue crews are still holding out hope that he may be bunkering down

01:31somewhere, waiting for police to arrive or waiting for the rescue team to reach him.

01:36We spoke to the family, just to prepare them for the fact that we were in day four of Gus being

01:47last seen.

01:48It's a long time, there's been someone being without water, food and shelter.

01:58So we just prepared the family for the fact that we might not be able to find Gus alive.

02:05So, but however, you know, we have from the start and we continue on hope that this little

02:14fella is tough and he is still hanging in there and we will find him today.

02:23According to Superintendent Cyrus, we'll have 90 pairs of boots on the ground today between

02:27police, SES crews and volunteers.

02:30And a group of 40 cadets coming in from out of town will also be part of that cohort trying

02:38to race against the clock, I suppose, to find any trace of Gus.

02:43We'll see you next time.

02:50We'll see you next time.

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