Eight people one car Jeremiah Rivers family living on hope living on prayer

Each morning, Jeremiah Rivers’ family members crowd eight into their only vehicle and rumble into the hot, south-western Queensland scrub.

Sustained by savings, donations from local businesses and money through GoFundMe, they are all who remain in the search for the popular 27-year-old missing almost three weeks.

Family members are all that remain of the Jeremiah Rivers search party almost three weeks since he disappeared in remote south-west Queensland.

They spread out, covering what ground they can, “living on hope, living on prayer” of succeeding where all the police, aircraft, cattle station staff and all-terrain vehicles have failed.

“We’re trying to be strong for him,” says best friend and brother Basil Althouse in a video message recorded near the search ground.

“We’re trying to be strong for ourselves, knowing he’s still out there.

“We know he’s still alive.”

The disappearance of Jeremiah “Jayo” Rivers, missing for almost three weeks in remote Queensland, is now being treated as suspicious.

Known to his family as “Jayo”, Mr Rivers walked off about 9.30am from the remote Wippo Creek camp he was sharing with six travelling companions and never returned, investigators have been told.

Of less faith than the family after two weeks sweeping this hostile country, police called off the official search this week and called in the homicide squad.

Detectives will soon re-interview the six campers, who have been in COVID-19 isolation in their respective states of NSW and Victoria after at least of two them tested positive to COVID-19.

“For [Mr Rivers] to have wandered off and to have disappeared is very unusual, and our evidence and inquiries to date have indicated some of the information we have is not consistent,” Detective Acting Superintendent Stephen Blanchfield said.

The nearest Bureau of Meteorology weather station, about 150 kilometres east of the search zone in the town of Thargomindah, showed temperatures reaching 40 degrees in the days after Mr Rivers’ disappearance.

There was little water and no food, Superintendent Blanchfield said, “so we do have grave concerns for his safety”.

But Mr Rivers, a three-time leading goalkicker with the division two side of Darwin’s Waratah Football Club, is fit and equipped with advanced bush skills.

“We’re hoping we can get more help,” uncle David Rivers said. “He ... wouldn’t give up on one of us, so we’ll never give up on him until we find him or get some answers where he is.

“At the moment it’s just the family. Just eight of us going out every day in one vehicle and covering as much ground as we can. We’ve got no other help. That’s about it â€" just family.”

Mr Rivers’ travelling party, described by police as two groups linked on their journey by a common friend, left Balranald in NSW on October 16.

Mr Rivers had been playing football there. He was on his way home to the Top End, where the season recently began.

They drove up through western NSW and at some point crossed illegally through a “previously locked” border gate and into Queensland, Superintendent Blanchfield said.

On October 19, the day after Mr Rivers wandered off, Queensland police discovered some members of the group and escorted them back to NSW.

The missing-person report was filed the same day, on the south side of the border.

Also about this time, some group members were diagnosed with COVID-19. The subsequent isolation period forced on them and Queensland’s hard borders complicated the early stages of the investigation.

Mr Rivers is one of eight siblings and has a large extended Aboriginal family through the Northern Territory and the east Kimberley region of Western Australia.

“He’s a good kid,” his uncle said. “Always looks after his brothers and sisters. A good young one.”

They will continue searching this weekend.

Zach Hope is a reporter at Brisbane Times. Got a story? Email me at zach.hope@brisbanetimes.com.auConnect via email.

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