Gus vanished last Saturday evening from his grandparents’ remote homestead

POLICE have made the heartbreaking decision to scale back the massive search for missing four-year-old August “Gus” Lamont.

POLICE have made the heartbreaking decision to scale back the massive search for missing four-year-old August “Gus” Lamont.

Officers spent a week scouring the South Australian outback but failed to find any trace of him.

Gus vanished last Saturday evening while playing outside his grandparents’ remote homestead about 24 miles south of Yunta, north-east of Adelaide.

His grandmother last saw him at 5pm on a dirt mound, but by 5.30pm he was gone.

The only clue searchers uncovered was a single child-sized footprint about 500 metres from the homestead.

No clothing, hat, or any other sign of the boy has been found.
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At its peak, more than 100 people were on the ground each day.

But professional survival experts warned that a four-year-old in Gus’s thin clothing faced almost impossible odds after so many nights in near-freezing temperatures.

He was wearing a grey broad-brimmed hat, a blue Minions shirt, light grey pants and boots.

Commissioner Parrott said: “In the last 48 hours, despite the professional advice it being unlikely that Gus would have survived, we have maintained and in fact increased the effort to try and locate him and bring him back to his family.

“In the last 48 hours, despite the professional advice it being unlikely that Gus would have survived, we have maintained and in fact increased the effort to try and locate him and bring him back to his family,”

ADF crews were stood down on Friday afternoon as police vehicles began to pull back from the isolated property.

Gus vanished last Saturday evening from his grandparents’ remote homestead

Police scoured thousands of miles in the Australian outback with no luck

Cops have now scaled back the search for Gus Lamont after a weekCredit: SA Police

Family clinging to hope

Earlier this week, family friend Bill Harbison released a statement on behalf of Gus’s devastated relatives.

“This has come as a shock to our family and friends, and we are struggling to comprehend what has happened,” he said.