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Four Australians on 30th birthday surf trip missing off Indonesia
By Chris Barrett and Karuni Rompies
Singapore/Jakarta: Four Australians on a surfing trip to Indonesia for a friend’s 30th birthday are missing off the coast of Indonesia’s Aceh province after their wooden speed boat struck rough weather en route to the remote Banyak Islands.
A search and rescue effort was launched on Monday in a bid to find the small vessel which disappeared on Sunday night and on which three Indonesian crew were also on board.
The four missing are Steph Weisse, Jordan Short, Elliot Foote and Will Teagle.Credit: Instagram
The four Australians are Elliot Foote, Steph Weisse, Will Teagle and Jordan Short.
The keen surfers had been travelling in Sumatra and on the island of Nias with eight other friends to celebrate Foote’s 30th birthday.
They were on two separate boats from Nias, 130 kilometres west of Sumatra, to the small island of Pinang in the Banyaks when they hit a storm. One of the boats reached the destination after taking shelter, but the other has not been seen since.
On Monday night, as Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade chartered a private plane to join the desperate search, Foote’s father Peter said they were holding out hope the group would be found safely.
The boat the four were travelling on when they went missing.
“They have life jackets on board, they had food and water and there is shelter on the boat. It has a roof,” he said from his home in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.
“Apparently the waves weren’t that problematic. It was just the visibility in the storm. We’re all hoping they’ve either run out of fuel or they got lost and missed the island or more likely there may be an engine failure on the boat, which unfortunately doesn’t have any GPS.”
The travelling party in Indonesia are all friends of Foote, a carpenter who went to school at Scots College in Sydney and had lived until recently in Bronte before moving to Mullumbimby to live with Weisse, his girlfriend, who is also 30.
His father said they intended to rent out bungalows on the small island of Pinang and stay there for 10 days.
“Elliot is turning 30 in September and for his 30th birthday I sent him and his mates there on surfing trip,” he said.
“There are a few Scots boys there, mates just from the beach in Bronte, and he’s recently moved to Mullumbimby, so there are some mates from there as well.”
Weisse, who is from Mullumbimby, works in a gardening nursery. Teagle is a landscaper from Bronte.
The eight friends whose boat did reach Pinang were “all beside themselves at the island”, Foote’s father said.
Foote had posted on Instagram a day earlier saying it was “good being back in Indo after so many years. Sharing waves with mates and the queen”.
“Starting the trip off with hiking in the North Sumatran jungle and seeing Orangutan’s [sic] was an amazing experience and something that I look forward to doing again for a longer time and going deeper.”
Basarnas, the National Search and Rescue Agency in Indonesia, said the boat had gone missing about 6pm on Sunday near an island in the Banyaks called Sarang Alu.
“Our team has arrived at Sarang Alu Island today to search the area. It is the last spot before both boats separated,” said Octavianto, the Basarnas chief in Nias, who like many Indonesians goes by one name.
Missing Australians Elliot Foote and Steph Weisse.Credit: Instagram
“The waves are three to four metres high. It is raining heavily and it’s dark. We can only use smaller boats with good aerodynamics due to the weather. We are searching within 40 nautical miles of Sarang Alu Island.”
The tourists had not reported their trip to the local port authority, he said.
Staff at the tiny resort there and rescue personnel in the Banyak Islands began the search at 2am on Monday but were unsuccessful.
Police, the military and volunteers have since joined Basarnas in a rescue team of more than 20 people.
More than 20 police and military are part of the rescue crew.
Octavianto said the boat did not have navigation devices.
The three Indonesians on board are the boat owner and two mechanics.
“The weather was bad yesterday afternoon until today ... very windy, and raining. Actually in the past one month the weather in Nias has been not so good,” Octavianto said. “They used simple boats, wooden boats ... they really went there on their own.”
The Nias search and rescue office was told the boat was missing on Monday morning, it said.
The Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade confirmed the search and rescue operation was under way and that it was providing consular assistance to the families of the four Australians.
“Our thoughts are with the family and friends of those missing during this distressing time,” a spokesperson said.
Pinang is marketed as a “protected tropical paradise hidden from the rest of the world”, with visitors able to rent out their own private island and stay in two ocean-fronting bungalows for a maximum of eight people.
Lying near the eponymous main island in the Banyaks, it boasts access to world-class waves at uncrowded surfing spots, as well as fishing, kayaking and a “castaway lifestyle”, according to the resort’s website.
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