A man who joined the search for missing four-year-old Gus Lamont has said he believes the young boy is “not on that property” after the area around where he disappeared from was combed.

A man who spent more than a decade as an SES volunteer has made a major admission after joining the search for a missing four-year-old boy who disappeared from an outback South Australian property more than a week ago.

A major search was launched to try and locate August “Gus” Lamont after he was last seen outside his family’s homestead, about 40km south of Yunta, on September 27.

Jason O’Connell, who was an SES volunteer for 11 years, has since told The Advertiser he believes there is “zero evidence” Gus is on the Oak Park Station property after he and his wife Jen spent more than 90 hours looking for him.

August “Gus” Lamont was last seen outside his family’s homestead, about 40km south of Yunta, on September 27. Picture: SA Police
He described the vast property as “just wide, open land”, adding that “there’s really not much there”.

“With our lights, I’m surprised because we just didn’t find anything,” Mr O’Connell said.

“He’s not on that property.”

The search was carried out mostly by vehicle, with the group checking fence lines and tracks over the span of several days to no avail.

Jason O’Connell, left, has told The Advertiser he believes there is “zero evidence” Gus is on the property after joining the search with his partner Jen. Picture: Supplied/Facebook

An absence of birds of prey on the homestead also suggested Gus was not there, Mr O’Connell said.

“If he was in a bad way or if he passed away, we’d listen for foxes, look for birds of prey,” he said.

“No birds of prey means he’s not there.”

Mr O’Connell had echoed the sentiment in a post on social media, writing, “I personally am very doubtful he is on the property”.

Assistant Commissioner Ian Parrott in a statement on Friday last week said Gus had been spotted by his grandmother playing on a mound of dirt at 5pm on the day he vanished.

He said the grandmother had gone outside at 5.30pm to call him in, but the boy had had vanished.

A family member had described Gus an a “shy but adventurous child”, who though was a “good walker”, had never left the property before he disappeared, he said.

A major search was launched to try and locate the four-year-old on the property. Picture: SA Police

The search for Gus was scaled back from Friday afternoon. Picture: Brett Hartwig
Assistant Commissioner Parrott announced the search operation would be scaled back from Friday afternoon, saying “We are confident that we have done all we can to locate Gus within the search area”.

“The search for Gus has been one of the largest, most intensive and most protracted searches ever undertaken by SAPOL,” he said in a statement.

“The determination of every individual involved to find Gus has never wavered.

“Like every member of the community who has been following this sad event, they too have been very much affected by what has happened.”

The investigation into Gus’s disappearance would now be be managed by the Missing Persons Investigation Section, Assistant Commissioner Parrot said.

Police had allocated massive resources to the search last week, with volunteers, divers, helicopters, all terrain vehicles and members of the Australian Defence Force fanned out over some 470 square kilometres to try to find the boy.

Tracker and former policeman Aaron Stuart also told The Advertiser it was unusual that only one footprint had been found so far.

“You’d find the next one, and the one after that,” Mr Stuart, who has helped authorities locate missing people and escaped prisoners in the bush,” he said.

“You don’t find one track, you find tracks. You’d soon find out if it was a decoy or anything like that.”