The search for Julia (8) from Pankow, who is missing in the Bohemian Forest, becomes a race against time!
Eight-year-old Julia from Berlin-Pankow has already disappeared for two nights in the border area between Bavaria and the Czech Republic. Police, fire brigade and helpers from other organizations are looking again at great expense on Tuesday.
“The chances of the girl are decreasing by the hour,” said police spokesman Josef Weindl on Tuesday of the “Passauer Neue Presse”.
“A child can do it for two days without eating or drinking,” he said. The cold is the big problem. During the night on the mountain where Julia disappeared, it was four degrees cold. However, there are ledges in the area under which the girl could have found shelter. “Every hour is important,” Weindl told the newspaper.
“Everyone here is wholeheartedly involved”
Police spokesman Florian Beck to BILD: “Of course, temperatures like this around freezing point are dangerous. We’re doing everything to find Julia alive. Everyone here is wholeheartedly involved. “
A so-called Alpine task force is now to help with the search. The police officers, who are specially trained for operations in the mountains, come from southern Upper Bavaria to the Upper Palatinate, said a police spokesman on Tuesday.
Witnesses should report
On Tuesday, the authorities called on all citizens who had been on the Cerchov mountain and its surroundings between 3 and 7 p.m. on Sunday to report immediately to the police emergency number.
The child has been missing since late Sunday afternoon. Her family hiked on the Czech mountain Cerchov (Schwarzkopf) at the weekend, the area is about two kilometers from the Bavarian border town of Waldmünchen.
In addition to their two children, the parents also had a nephew with them. According to the information so far, the adults lost sight of the three children who were playing in the forest. The couple’s six-year-old son and nine-year-old nephew were eventually found, with the eight-year-old daughter missing.
Looking for dogs, helicopters and hundreds of emergency services
Several hundred emergency services such as police officers, mountain rescue workers and firefighters had also looked for the student in the area on Monday. The emergency services come from both the Czech Republic and Germany. Police helicopters from Bavaria also circled over the area in Bohemia, dog squadrons were in action on the ground. In addition, off-road special vehicles were used.
But: Dense treetops make the search difficult. “Thermal imaging cameras do not come through the treetops,” said a police spokesman on Tuesday. They were in use until morning – “but unfortunately without any result”.
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What the brother and cousin said about the disappearance, the spokesman did not want to say “for tactical reasons”.
The police continue to assume no crime and suspect that the eight-year-old got lost. “It is difficult terrain, there is deep forest all around,” said Czech police spokeswoman Dana Ladmanova. The girl’s family is looked after by psychologists: “They are doing according to the circumstances.”
Foresters and employees of the Bohemian Forest National Park (Sumava), who are familiar with the impassable and sometimes rocky terrain, also help in the search. The Sumava National Park borders the oldest German National Park in the Bavarian Forest. According to current information, a total of around 800 emergency services on the Czech and German sides were involved in the search between Sunday afternoon and Monday evening.
Please no private search!
The police released a video showing emergency services combing the forest in a long line. A helicopter with a thermal imaging camera was also in use. The area near the border was a restricted military area during the Cold War.
The police appealed to the local people not to search for Julia on their own. “We ask you not to dare to climb the mountain, but to stay down here on the streets and in the surrounding communities to keep your eyes open, simply so as not to put yourself in danger here,” said a spokesman for the police headquarters Upper Palatinate. “Not that we might have to rescue other people from the mountain or even look for them.”
On the Czech side, too, the police advised volunteers not to take part in the search. Should that change, they will get in touch. “Thank you for not being indifferent,” wrote a spokesman on Twitter.