A German backpacker missing for 12 days in WA’s outback has been found alive.<\/p>\n
The ABC has confirmed Carolina Wilga, 26, was discovered alive late on Friday afternoon.<\/p>\n
Prior to that, Ms Wilga was last seen on June 29 at a general store in Beacon in WA’s Wheatbelt, three-and-a-half hours drive north-east of Perth.<\/p>\n
Loading…<\/p>\n
Police discovered her abandoned vehicle deep in a nature reserve 36 kilometres north of the town on Thursday afternoon and conducted a large-scale aerial search.<\/p>\n
A police spokesperson said Ms Wilga was found “safe and well.”<\/p>\n
WA Police Inspector Martin Glynn said Ms Wilga was found walking along a bush track at the edge of the Karroun Hill Nature Reserve by a member of the public.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
A red marker on a map where Ms Wilga’s broken down car was found. (Supplied: Google Earth\/ABC News)<\/p>\n
“She is now en route to a hospital in Perth for some medical attention,” he said.<\/p>\n
“As you can imagine from the trauma she’s suffered for the last few days, she’s been obviously through a great deal.<\/p>\n
“She does have some injuries, she’s been ravaged by mosquitoes, she’s been through an incredible journey of trauma.<\/p>\n
“No doubt, [it] will be a testament to demonstrating her bravery in these circumstances.”<\/p>\n
‘Fragile condition’<\/p>\n
Inspector Glynn said Ms Wilga had been airlifted away from Beacon and her family had been notified of her wellbeing.<\/p>\n
He said she was in a “fragile condition” and the conditions she endured would have been “a thousand times worse” than the difficult terrain searchers experienced.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Bush in the area is dense, as seen in this photo taken near the edge of Karroun Hill where agricultural land meets the wilderness. (ABC News: Mitchell Edgar)<\/p>\n
“You always go out with the best of hope that you will find the person and obviously this is a great outcome for everyone involved,” Inspector Glynn said.<\/p>\n
“I think once we do hear her story it will be a remarkable story.<\/p>\n
“She’s coped in some amazing conditions, it’s a very hostile environment out there both from flora and fauna \u2026 and the weather conditions have been really adverse with temperatures getting down to zero at night.”<\/p>\n
Inspector Glynn said while the backpacker had minor injuries, she did not appear to be seriously hurt.<\/p>\n
WA Premier Roger Cook posted on social media at 5:45pm WST thanking those who assisted in the search.<\/p>\n
“This news is nothing short of remarkable,” he wrote.<\/p>\n
“To our emergency services and everyone who searched, shared information, and supported the family through this ordeal \u2014 thank you.<\/p>\n
“We’re yet to have the full picture of what happened, but tonight, we can all breathe a little easier knowing Carolina is safe and well.”<\/p>\n
Loading<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A German backpacker missing for 12 days in WA’s outback has been found alive. The ABC has confirmed…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":56613,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4740,41530,41525,41529,41526,41532,41527,5425,50,8631,7207,41531,8632,41528],"class_list":{"0":"post-56612","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-australia","9":"tag-beacon","10":"tag-carolina-wilga","11":"tag-dowerin","12":"tag-german-backpacker","13":"tag-missing-backpacker","14":"tag-missing-backpacker-wa","15":"tag-missing-person","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-perth-news","18":"tag-police","19":"tag-toodyay","20":"tag-wa-news","21":"tag-wheatbelt"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114834148202331964","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56612","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56612"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56612\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56613"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56612"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56612"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56612"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}