OMG. Anybody just seen GMTV? 3 yr old girl abducted on holiday on the Algarve.

[tiredemma]

kate said reports just in, cant find anything on bbc.

bloody awful.

Apparently there?s a helicopter flying over the resort now, which has been described by the bbc correspondent as a bad sign.

mumpbumo the op isn't suggesting we debate anything it is merely reporting the news.Why are you so adamant on starting an argument over something so tragic

Truly, truly tragic i hope & pray the little girl comes back safe

Here I am. I started the thread early this morning- not with any intention of a debate about it, and I feel looking at my thread title that did 'over-sensationalise' a bit.

I just quickly typed in exactly what I had heard that KAte Garraway woman say on GMTV.

Had I waited before I started the thread, I would have title it '3yr old missing on algarve' without the OMG! bit and the 'abducted' thrown in.

The thread title- like the news has sensationalised it I feel, and I wish I had waited to write it, get my facts right and not over dramatise the whole thing.

But lets not turn it into a debate over whether her parents are at fault, thats cruel and insesitive.

I'm don't particularly want to start an argument, but if you post a thread for open discussion which involves what seems to be a potentially contraversial parenting decision on a parenting forum, I just don't understand why people then try to stop people from discussing it by saying things like "this is not the time for such and such discussion".

So I have been on these types of holidays, Mark Warner, Sunsail, all are the same....

You leave your kids in the room hopefully asleep whilst you go to the restaurant and eat....carers go around and listen at the door every 20 minutes and come and get you at the first sign of trouble...

Now, without naming names, the one I went on in Greece was terrible. We were all sitting at dinner and a little one (3 or 4) came wandering down to find her mum....this was because the kids could open the door from the inside regardless of how it was locked...this was not safe and I reported it as a problem...all you need is some little kid walking out and into the pool

Anyway, reading the news it looks a whole lot more sinister than this with the shutters having been forced apparently. What I am mystified about is at all of these resorts they normally have security guards on duty at the entrance to stop the locals coming in.....

I just hope they find her safe and well. It is my worst nightmare and given we are going in 4 weeks to a similar resort, we are panicking....

I have been to the Ocean Club where this terrible incident has occured. The trouble with it is that it is not a 'campus style' resort as such. Some of the apartments are in a village setting and the roads that they are on are not private and are not part of the Mark Warner resort. You could not put guards at the gates and ensure that all the cars that passed by were guests of the resort.
Mark Warner simply rent part of the Ocean Club for their use, other parts of it are privately owned.
Obviously i do not know exectly where the aprtment was that this family were staying in, but some apartments would be more secure than others.

mumpbump - no-one is doubting that there is a debate about wether to leave children in a hotel room (or the like) and pop out - the 'discussion' has happened many a time on mumsnet but the fact is A 3 YEAR OLD GIRL IS MISSING AND NOW IS NOT THE TIME TO HAVE THE DEBATE.

I don't usually go by this but this has really touched me, I have a near 3 year old DD with long blonde hair, I know the area very very well, my brother used to live there and we have family friends there, this whole is a little too close for comfort for me so please if you are going to start a debate about it can you please do it on another thread so others who are mainly concerned about this little girls wellfare and not pointing the finger can stick here.

I think that Mark Warner could have been a little more compassionate on their website.

It just makes you realise how precious these little ones are - even when we argue with them for being naughty.

I do so hope that the family have some news soon.

And there was me worrying about what people would thinkof me taking the annny on holiday-sadly Iam absolutely sure I made the right decision now

A friend of mine used to work in the same hospital department as the mother (who is a doctor) of this little girl. Makes me feel sick just thinking about it. I can't imagine how the family must be feeling. Their twin boys were asleep in the same room and they could see the apartment door from the restaurant. I can imagine how you can get lulled into a sense of security in these places - or even at home FGS, there was a girl taken from her bath not long ago.

I have heard that they think this was planned and the little girl was targeted after having been watched for a few days. My mind goes numb at the thought of how you would possibly cope with such an event.

God I feel heartbroken after watching the news

i hate the fact that they mention that the parents are doctors

why do they do that

to show they are middle class and respectable, and therefore It Could Happen To Anyone (including tv presenters and journalists)

Those poor parents. It's evening time there now and still no sign of that beautiful little girl, I feel so sorry for them and I so hope the outcome is good and not the awful one it looks like it is turning out to be. I'll just keep praying for her.

So still no news?

because they haven't got anything else to say...and people are desparate fo0r news, news, news.

It sounds like the apartment was broken into via a window and the girl taken discretely out of the back out of sight of the parents - who were said to be 50 metres away and in sight of the front door to the apratment.

Really, the parents could have been on the terrace of a 3-roomed ground floor apartment, listening to music, and someone could have broken into the back of a child's room. This could have happened anywhere, to anyone, in any manner of setting.

God, it must have been whatever evil bastard/s did this had been watching her/them. SO SO terrible, what is wrong with people?

No update at all NBG - apart from Madeline's aunt saying that Dad went back to check and everything was fine, mum went back half hour later, window was open and shutters were pulled up - they weren't left like that when Dad left half an hour earlier

Actually Enid , I see your point. I do think this couple have been given more slack on the news coverage than a less middle class couple would have. Radio news keeps stressing how close the parents were to the room and how often they checked on her as if to emphasise that they were not neglectful parents. I'm not sure that grace would be offered to some other types of parents.

Still, it's not the parents fault how the news is reported.

just can't bear to think of how they must be feeling - last year I went to get dd up and she wasn't in our bed in our (new) house. I went from room to room, calling and slowly starting to panic - was starting to scream her name and ds was crying with shock at how scared I sounded when I saw her hiding in the laundry bin.

It's just unbearable. I just hope maybe some childless, disturbed woman has snatched her rather than the alternative