UPDATE: The body of a three-year-old boy has been found a day after the toddler fell into a fast moving creek in Dandenong.
Police confirmed the body of Ishnael Baqaie of Doveton had been found in Dandenong Creek near Greens Road shortly after 4pm on Thursday.
Ishnael was at a playground with his parents on Wednesday afternoon when he is thought to have entered the creek.
A passerby thought they spotted a small child in the water downstream and called emergency services at about 2.30pm.
The boy and his family had reportedly arrived in Australia from Afghanistan less than a month ago.
Earlier on Thursday State Emergency Service volunteers and police gathered at the site about 5.30am, following a frantic search on Wednesday prompted by a possible sighting of a child bobbing in the overflowing creek.
Superintendent David Clayton said on Wednesday the creek “had very swift water” because of Tuesday’s storms.
Dozens of police, firefighters and other emergency services searched along two kilometres of the creek for hours while a police helicopter hovered overhead, reportedly using a thermal imagine device.
– with Caroline Zielinkski
