Missing 8-year-old boy in Germany has been found alive in a sewer eight days after he went missing in Oldenburg, northwestern Germany.
According to BBC, the missing 8-year-old boy, who has only been named as Joe, disappeared from his family garden in Oldenburg on 17 June, sparking a large police search. He was finally discovered on Saturday morning, 25 June, when a passer-by heard a faint whimpering sound coming from a manhole cover on Saturday morning and alerted the emergency services, the Oldenburg-Stadt / Ammerland police department said in a statement Tuesday.
The missing 8-year-old boy Joe was found just 1,000 feet from his home address and was taken to a nearby hospital, where he was treated for hypothermia and dehydration.
Police said they didn’t believe anyone else was involved in the incident.
An initial police report described Joe as having a learning disability. While the search was ongoing, they said he might misinterpret it as a game and continue hiding.
Joe’s surname hasn’t been made public, in accordance with Germany’s privacy laws.
Immediately after the rescue, investigators started scanning the drainage system for clues to how he disappeared.
The authorities concluded Joe most likely climbed into a concrete drainage pipe while playing, and then crawled into the sewer system through a canal and got lost after several meters.
Investigators said that, between the entrance to the drainage system and the place where Joe was found, there are drainage manhole shafts and junctions at regular intervals where he was able to stand up.
Joe told police in an initial statement that he became increasingly disoriented while stuck in the sewers and was unable to find his way out.