Missing man's son makes desperate appeal

A search and rescue operation failed to yield any clues as to the fate of 73-year-old Stefan Jensen. File photo / Herald on Sunday

A missing 73-year-old man's son is making a desperate appeal to anyone who may have seen his father, who has been missing south of Auckland for nearly four weeks.

Stefan Jensen, who suffers from mild dementia, disappeared on June 4 from his son's rural property on Geraghty Rd in Pukekawa, 24km southeast of Pukekohe.

A substantial search and rescue operation failed to uncover any clues as to his whereabouts and his son, Alexis Jensen, is beginning to fear the worst.

"I'm being quite realistic in thinking that by this point something bad's probably happened, but I really do want to appeal to anyone who has even a vague thought that they've seen him to get in contact with the police," he said.

He had not used his bank accounts since going missing and all reported sightings have proven to be cases of mistaken identity, he said.

His father was unable to continue living on his own so moved into his son's family home, which is surrounded by farms and about 2km from a river.

The family has since moved out because all they could think about was that his father was in the river, he said.

Stefan Jensen was "fiercely independent and very intelligent" and fit for his age, so the family still held hope he was alive and well.

"He could be lost and doesn't know how to get home. He's got a grandchild who he loves to bits and another one about to be born and he's not going to know him so it's quite tragic really," he said.

"Unfortunately it's got to that point where we've got to get on with life and go back to work."

Mr Jensen was described as about 1.78m tall, medium build, broad shouldered, and bald with a grey moustache.

He was wearing a navy coloured turtle neck jersey with a black and grey pattern on the front, navy trousers, and black shoes.

- NZPA