The mayor of the island at the centre of a massive search operation looking for missing TV doctor and health expert Michael Mosley has said police are investigating a possible sighting amid theories that he could have fainted in 48C heat. Dr Mosley vanished on Symi on Wednesday while on a walk to the centre of the island.
Dr Mosley and his wife Claire landed on the 25-square-mile island on Tuesday and were due to stay for a week with a couple who have a house in Symi Town. The two couples took a boat up the coast on Wednesday morning. They stopped at Saint Nicholas beach where the diet doctor, a father of four, went for a swim in the sea before deciding to walk the 2.2 miles back home at 1.30pm.
He had left his phone at their friends’ home, and when Dr Bailey and the couple returned to the property, they found that Dr Mosley had not returned and his mobile was where he left it.
Mayor of Symi Eleftherios Papakalodoukas said he had potentially been seen by some people and the sightings were being investigated. He said: “The British broadcaster has come for holiday with his wife and is being hosted by a couple of their friends on our island. We know he had gone for a swim...but because he likes hiking and the area, he (decided he) would walk back.
“Some witnesses said he was seen returning to Pedi and talking to another person. All of these are testimonies that are being investigated at the moment.” Mr Papakalodoukas told the local paper, Kathimerini, that the high temperatures on the island on Wednesday were ‘unbearable’ and that ‘one could easily faint in such conditions’. An excessive heat warning was issued by the Greek meteorological service on the day Mr Mosley went missing.
Police last night said the search was focusing on the Pedi area where the alleged sighting was made by a local woman. A helicopter has been brought in and a special police dog unit will arrive today. Police confirmed ‘all involved parties have been questioned’.
Greek police officials acknowledged that the disappearance of such a high-profile figure posed a huge challenge at the start of the tourist season. Mr Papakalodoukas added: “He may have slipped and fallen, perhaps because of a heart attack along the way,’ a police source said. ‘Nothing at this stage can be ruled out.”
Twenty-five police officers and firefighters have been using drones and a specialist dog unit to scour the island, which is part of the Dodecanese island chain and is about 25 miles north of Rhodes. Local officials described the temperature on the island as ‘unbearable’ on the day the health medical expert went missing.
The local police department confirmed at around 7am on Friday that officers are scouring the island following them pausing the search-and-rescue operation for the 67-year-old British national on Thursday night. Police and firefighters have been using drones to try and locate Mosley, who was reported to have vanished after setting off on a walk to the centre of the island on Wednesday, and a helicopter was deployed on Thursday to assist in the search.
More officers will join the search-and-rescue operation on Symi, which is part of the Dodecanese island chain and is about 25 miles north of Rhodes.
The rescue operation is said to be focusing on the Pedi area of the island after a woman reported seeing Mosley, known for popularising the 5:2 diet and for his appearances on The One Show and This Morning, there on Wednesday.
A woman in the area said Mosley’s disappearance was “strange” as the path he was thought to be on is “clear”.
She said: “It’s a quiet place … if you see the map of the area it’s a clear path, it’s nothing dangerous, many people go every day, every few minutes, that’s the reason it’s very strange because it’s a clear path.”
A friend of the person Mosley was staying with said she was struggling to understand how anyone could get lost on the part of the island he was believed to be on.
Speaking to BBC Radio 5 Live’s Drive programme, she said: “It’s a road that sort of heads over the mountainside but it’s been recently widened and there is only one route, so it’s not possible to lose your way.
“So, it is probably a 20-minute walk down the side of the mountain, but it’s not overly rugged or something that would be seen to be too dangerous, it’s something that tourists do every day in the summer. I’m having trouble understanding how you could get lost.”
Story Saved
You can find this story in My Bookmarks.Or by navigating to the user icon in the top right.
