{"id":58559,"date":"2026-07-26T06:46:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T06:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/58559\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T06:46:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T06:46:08","slug":"sister-heartbroken-as-search-for-brother-along-goulburn-river-concludes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/58559\/","title":{"rendered":"Sister ‘heartbroken’ as search for brother along Goulburn River concludes"},"content":{"rendered":"

The sister of Shane Wilson, the man feared drowned after he disappeared while fishing on the Goulburn River, says she was “heartbroken” to hear the search for him was ending.<\/p>\n

Mr Wilson, 53, was fishing from a kayak on the Goulburn River on Saturday, July 18, when the boat overturned.<\/p>\n

A week after a search was initiated, Victoria Police said the recovery effort had ended.<\/p>\n

“Sadly, with the passage of time and environmental conditions in the area, police hold grave concerns for the man\u2019s welfare and have been working to recover his body,” a spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

\"Man<\/p>\n

Melissa Teague said Shane Wilson was an “incredible” brother who always made time for her.\u00a0 (Supplied: Melissa Teague)<\/p>\n

Mr Wilson’s sister, Melissa Teague, said her family was “incredibly disappointed” that the search was ending.<\/p>\n

“I\u2019m angry,” she said.<\/p>\n

“It feels like the search is being scaled back before we\u2019ve had the chance to bring Shane home, and that\u2019s devastating for us.<\/p>\n

“We were told to prepare ourselves for the possibility that Shane may never be found. Hearing those words while we\u2019re desperately waiting for answers was absolutely heartbreaking.”<\/p>\n

Ms Teague said she had a close relationship with her brother, who was 13 years older than her.<\/p>\n

“He always made time for me,” she said.<\/p>\n

“We\u2019d cook potato gems together and watch all my favourite cartoons.<\/p>\n

“He\u2019d play with me on the trampoline, teach me things, and when he was painting around the house, he\u2019d hand me a little pot of water and a paintbrush so I thought I was helping.”<\/p>\n

\"Three<\/p>\n

The SES assisted in the multi-agency search. (Facebook: SES Chiltern)<\/p>\n

A week-long search<\/p>\n

Emergency Services were called to the river on July 18, after a witness on the riverbank raised the alarm about Mr Wilson.<\/p>\n

Victoria Police, the Country Fire Authority, Lifesaving Victoria and the State Emergency Service (SES) were involved in the search.<\/p>\n

An SES spokesperson had said Mr Wilson was a “strong swimmer”, but the current was “flowing quite rapidly”.<\/p>\n

Mr Wilson was not wearing a life jacket.<\/p>\n

Police did not respond to questions about why the search had concluded but confirmed they had been in contact with the family regarding the developments along the way.<\/p>\n

“Officers will revisit the area if further information is received or if there are any new developments,” a spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

\"Woman<\/p>\n

Melissa Teague says she misses talking to her older brother. (Supplied: Melissa Teague)<\/p>\n

Ms Teague said she never called Mr Wilson by his first name; he was always ‘brudda’ to her.<\/p>\n

“Ever since I was little, I couldn’t say ‘brother’, so I called him ‘brudda’. It just stuck,” she said.<\/p>\n

Ms Teague said Mr Wilson would call her regularly “nearly every day on his drive home from work, usually complaining about Melbourne traffic”.<\/p>\n

“Those everyday conversations are what I miss the most. He wasn’t just my big brother \u2026 he was my best friend,” Ms Teague said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The sister of Shane Wilson, the man feared drowned after he disappeared while fishing on the Goulburn River,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":58560,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,21,62680,62678,5663,62679,1373],"class_list":["post-58559","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-goulburn-river","tag-kayak","tag-ses","tag-shane-wilson","tag-victoria-police"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58559","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58559"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58559\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/58560"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58559"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58559"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58559"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}