Divers Widened Their Search of the Tagus on Saturday for a British Visitor Missing Since Wednesday at the Alcantara Docks

Search teams went back into the Tagus on Saturday looking for Julian Amaral, a 23-year-old British man missing since the early hours of Wednesday, after a party held aboard a boat on the river in Lisbon. He was on holiday in Portugal, staying with relatives, and had gone to the event with a cousin.

The Polícia de Segurança Pública (Public Security Police, PSP) confirmed that a missing-person report for a 23-year-old man was filed at its Alcântara station, and that he had disappeared from a vessel at the Alcântara docks.

The timeline

He boarded the boat carrying the Vida de Jovem Fest party in the late afternoon of Tuesday 1 September. At some point he told his cousin he was going to the toilet, and he was not seen again. The vessel docked at Rocha Conde de Óbidos around midnight. Two security staff saw him leave, but could not say where he went. His phone was switched off. Relatives said he did not know Portugal and did not speak Portuguese, which they feared would make finding him harder.

The Polícia Marítima (Maritime Police) began searching around Rocha Conde de Óbidos on Thursday, roughly 24 hours after the disappearance was reported. On Friday the Autoridade Marítima Nacional (National Maritime Authority) confirmed in a statement that officers from the Lisbon Local Command were working the river between the Vasco da Gama bridge and Algés, supported by a drone and an aircraft of the Força Aérea Portuguesa (Portuguese Air Force), and that the force's Forensic Diving and Underwater Operations Group had searched the Doca de Alcântara that morning. The causes of the occurrence, it said, remained unknown.

What investigators now think happened

The working assumption has shifted. "Today the strongest indications are that he may have fallen into the water, but yesterday what was thought was that the young man had left the vessel," commander Ricardo Sá told the Lusa news agency on Friday.

Correio da Manhã reported, in copy carried by Notícias ao Minuto, that PSP criminal investigators had recovered closed-circuit footage showing Amaral falling into the Tagus after leaving the boat at the Alcântara docks. The same report said the dive team searched the area where he is believed to have entered the water, found nothing, and that the search zone was then widened. Searches resumed on Saturday.

The Vida de Jovem promoter posted on social media on Wednesday to express its concern, appealing for information and offering to co-operate with the investigation.

A river that is not a swimming pool

The stretch of the Tagus in front of Lisbon is a tidal estuary, not still water, and it runs fast on the ebb. That is why the search box the Maritime Police drew stretches for kilometres in both directions rather than sitting over the point of entry.

The wider figures are not reassuring. Portugal recorded 92 drownings by 31 July this year, a decade record, with rivers accounting for more than a third. The Maritime Police is stretched across a long list of summer duties, including the 58 officers it supplied to the beach operation the tax authority extended into September. Emergency communications are a separate running story here: deaf residents lost their direct line to 112 in December 2021 and still have no replacement.

What this means for you

• Report a disappearance immediately, and do not wait 24 hours. There is no waiting period in Portugal. Report to the PSP in cities or the GNR elsewhere, or call 112. On or near the water, the Maritime Police and the harbour master's office take the lead.
• Say straight away if the person is a foreign national. It changes what the authorities can check, and it lets the relevant embassy or consulate be brought in. British nationals and their families can contact the British Embassy in Lisbon for consular support.
• Give the authorities the digital trail early. Last known phone activity, card use and the exact vessel or venue matter more in the first hours than anything else.
• Party boats are licensed maritime tourism operations. They carry passenger lists and security staff, and both become part of the record when something goes wrong.

The searches are continuing, and neither the Maritime Police nor the PSP has offered a conclusion. Our coverage of the Lisbon week, including the river and the port, runs in this week's Lisboa Brief.

Feature image: Doca de Alcântara and the Tagus, Lisbon. Photograph by ProtoplasmaKid, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.