Süderoog mystery camera traced to Hull

A happy end emerged Tuesday in a week-long media search for the boy who filmed his summertime beach visit in Yorkshire before his waterproof camera was swept across the North Sea to Süderoog island.

Read more: The camera that floated across the North Sea

The German Maritime Search and Rescue Association (DGzRS) said William's father posted a message Monday night on the Facebook site of Süderoog's coastal park keepers, Nele Wree and Holger Spreer (pictured above). 

"Hi. The action camera is the one my son lost whilst out with his Nanna at Thornwick Bay," wrote the father.

A friend of his son had read about the search in Britain's Guardian newspaper, he added, telling Süderoog's keepers that his son had been very upset over the loss and astounded by its finding.

When the camera will be handed back has not yet been clarified, said DGzRS spokesman Ralf Bauer, adding that a visit by the boy to Süderoog was conceivable. 

Found among flotsam

The electronic device was found among flotsam on November 2 by Roland Spreer, a relative of the coastal park employees, who published part of its digital content - an 11-minute video sequence.

Online viewers identified the starting point as a rock pool at Thornwick Bay, near the Flamborough Cliffs on England's East Yorkshire coast.

DGzRS headquarters in Bremen, applying modelling software used to trace missing boats and crews, estimated the camera drifted, zig-zag, some 800 kilometers (500 miles), before being washed ashore at Süderoog, south of the German-Danish border.

The small island known in northern Germany as a hallig lies exposed to North Sea storm floods and lies in Schleswig-Holstein state as part of the Wadden Sea National Park, a UNESCO world heritage site.

ipj/jm (epd, dpa)