text: Yoshiki Fujimoto, 2, is rescued on Aug. 15 after he went missing in Suo-Oshima, Yamaguchi Prefecture, on Aug. 12. (Provided by Yamaguchi Asahi Broadcasting Ltd.) 
   
   SUO-OSHIMA, Yamaguchi Prefecture--A 2-year-old boy missing for three days was found safe and well Aug. 15 on a mountain just a few hundred meters from his great-grandfather’s home here. 
   
   Yoshiki Fujimoto, of Hofu in the prefecture, was discovered around 6:30 a.m. by a 78-year-old volunteer from Oita Prefecture who had joined the search operation, Yamaguchi prefectural police said. 
   
   Haruo Obata had gone up the mountain, northeast from the great-grandfather’s house, close to where Yoshiki had last been seen, to search for the boy. After repeatedly calling his name, he got a reply: “I’m here.” 
   
   Obata said, “I found him sitting on a moss-covered rock in the middle of a mountain stream, with his feet dangling in the water. 
   
   “I thought he was in pretty good shape because he snatched a bag of candy which I gave him and crunched on them.” 
   
   Obata wrapped the boy in a towel and descended the mountain, joining police officers on the way, who drove the boy to his great-grandfather’s home, where his anxious family was waiting for him. 
   
   Yoshiki’s 37-year-old mother burst into tears when she saw him. Yoshiki had no problem conversing with his mother and grandmother, according to police. 
   
   The boy was taken to a hospital in Yanai in the prefecture for a checkup. 
   
   A doctor said he was suffering from dehydration and had scratches and tick bites on his skin, but no obvious injuries. 
   
   The child clung to his mother, saying, “Mommy.” He is expected to remain in hospital for several days. 
   
   The boy's 66-year-old grandfather took Yoshiki and his 3-year-old brother to swim in the sea about 400 meters from the home around 10:30 a.m. on Aug. 12. 
   
   After walking 100 meters or so toward the beach, Yoshiki suddenly announced, “I want to go home,” and started walking back. 
   
   The grandfather watched, apparently unconcerned that the boy could get lost. 
   
   Yoshiki's mother and two other children who left the house soon afterward did not come across him, and the family then realized that he had gone missing. 
   
   About 150 prefectural police officers and firefighters had been searching for Yoshiki since Aug. 12, focusing on the area around his great-grandfather’s home. 
   
   On Aug. 14, Yoshiki’s mother called out to him through a community wireless system, saying, “Yo-chan, say anything. Come out soon.” But there was no reply. 
   
   Yuichi Koide, who heads the department of clinical research at the National Hospital Organization Disaster Medical Center, said, “I am relieved the boy is safe as it is extremely difficult for a 2-year-old child to endure three days outdoors under such harsh conditions.” 
   
   The highest temperature was around 33 degrees in Suo-Oshima over the three days from Aug. 12. ||||| The discovery of an uninjured two-year-old boy who had been missing for three days on a western Japan island was touted as a “miracle”, with experts pointing to some favourable conditions and unique characteristics of the toddler involved. 
   
   Yoshiki Fujimoto was found Wednesday by a volunteer searcher barefooted and sitting on a mossy stone in the middle of a stream on a mountain about 68 hours after he had become unaccounted for in the town of Suo-Oshima on Yashiro Island in Yamaguchi Prefecture, just shy of the 72 hours after which the chance of survival is believed to drop. 
   
   Paediatricians and experts were surprised that the boy was found alive as temperatures on the island topped 30 degrees Celsius (86 Fahrenheit) between Sunday and Tuesday. 
   
   “I was most worried about possible heatstroke but the boy may have found shade near the stream and drunk water. It must have been a result of a number of miraculously favourable conditions,” said Mieko Miyata, the head of a non-profit organisation promoting safety education for children. 
   
   “Water intake is essential for babies and toddlers because they are more vulnerable to dehydration compared with adults,” said Eiichi Ishii, a professor at Ehime University’s paediatrics department. 
   
   “The boy may have not sweated much in the shade but it is surprising he hung on in the hot environment. Three days is close to the limit.” 
   
   Yoshiki, from Hofu, Yamaguchi Prefecture, had been visiting his great-grandfather’s house since Sunday, and went missing the same day after heading for a beach about 400 meters away with his grandfather Masanori and three-year-old brother. 
   
   After about 100 metres, Yoshiki tried to return to the house on his own but subsequently disappeared. He was found at around 6:30am on Wednesday on a mountain only 560 metres from the house. 
   
   According to Keisen University President Masami Ohinata, who is well versed in children’s development psychology, it is difficult for two-year-olds to objectively look at situations they are in. 
   
   “(Small children) are unlikely to walk around or despair out of fear. 
   
   Their underdeveloped judgement and cognitive capacities may have helped prevent the boy from getting stressed or exhausted,” she said. 
   
   She also said the boy’s discovery on a mountain was the result of the unpredictable behaviour of two-year-olds who are often referred to as the “terrible twos”. 
   
   “For two-year-olds as tall as about 90 centimetres, a small space which looks like a bush for adults can be seen as a trail,” Ohinata said. 
   
   Despite a search effort involving 380 police officers and rescuers as well as drones with thermal imaging cameras, the mountain where the boy was eventually found was left unsearched until the volunteer Haruo Obata went there and quickly found him. 
   
   Rescuers dived in water reservoirs and combed paddy fields as well as roads but not the mountain, prompting some police officers to voice regret that they should have expanded the search area earlier. 
   
   Obata, 78, from Oita Prefecture went onto a mountain trail, believing small children tend to climb up rather than descend based on his experience of joining a different search operation for a two-year-old girl found on a mountain in the Oita city of Saiki in 2016. 
   
   It took just 30 minutes before he heard Yoshiki reply to his call and found him sitting on the stone. 
   
   The site can be reached by following a trail stretching from the great-grandfather’s home but the footing was unstable as the pass was covered with fallen rocks and leaves. 
   
   “I would like to thank the police, rescuers and local people,” said the boy’s grandfather Masanori. 
   
   “I apologise as it was I who took my eyes off him.” ||||| TOKYO: A two-year-old boy who went missing in woods in western Japan has been found unharmed after three days alone, apparently surviving on river water as volunteers hunted desperately for him. 
   
   Yoshiki Fujimoto disappeared on Sunday morning in the Yamaguchi region while out walking with his brother and grandfather, and the search for him made headlines nationwide. 
   
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   Yoshiki Fujimoto, who went missing on Sunday (Aug 12). (Photo: Yamaguchi prefectural police) 
   
   Police and locals combed the woods looking for him, but it was a 78-year-old volunteer from a neighbouring region who stumbled upon the toddler on Wednesday morning. 
   
   "I shouted 'Yo-chan'," Haruo Obata told local television, a red towel wrapped around his head against the summer heat. 
   
   "He replied 'yes, here' and there he was," added Obata, a retiree who said he regularly volunteers in disaster relief efforts. 
   
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   The toddler was sitting on a rock, with his bare feet in a small puddle of water in front of him, Obata said. 
   
   "At first, I didn't think it was a human." he told reporters. "But there he was. I thought my heart was going to stop." 
   
   The toddler's miraculous survival is all the more astonishing given the hot weather in Japan in recent weeks, with local media saying the temperature where he went missing hit 34 degrees Celsius (93 degrees Fahrenheit) during his three-day ordeal. 
   
   The woodland area has creeks and rivers, and some media speculated the resourceful tot, who turned two on Monday while he was missing, survived by drinking from them. 
   
   "He doesn't have any major injuries, just a few scratches and slight dehydration," said Hiroyuki Nishihara, an official at the local hospital treating Fujimoto. 
   
   "But his life isn't in danger and he will be able to leave the hospital very soon." 
   
   The toddler disappeared on Sunday after his grandfather let him walk back alone to the house - around 100 metres away - where the child's mother was waiting. 
   
   But Fujimoto never made it to the house, and appears to have wandered off en route, prompting a massive manhunt that gripped Japan during its quiet summer season. 
   
   Drones with optical and thermal cameras, search dogs and helicopters were drafted in for the search, along with around 160 police and more volunteers. 
   
   But in the end, he was found just a few hundred metres from where he disappeared, to his family's relief. 
   
   "I couldn't help but squeeze him tight," his tearful mother Mio Fujimoto told local television. "I'm so grateful my son returned safely ... He is sleeping tight now, he seemed relieved but tired." 
   
   "That this volunteer would come all the way here, all we can do is offer thanks from the bottom of our hearts," the boy's grandfather added.
target: – Most toddlers celebrate turning 2 with cake and presents. Yoshiki Fujimoto spent his birthday lost on a Japanese mountain, the subject of a frantic three-day search after he disappeared while with his grandfather. The South China Morning Post reports on the "miracle" of a volunteer finding Yoshiki Wednesday, perched with no shoes on a rock in the middle of a stream on Yashiro Island, almost 72 hours after he was reported missing. The Asahi Shimbun notes the boy had been headed to the beach on Aug. 12 with his grandfather and 3-year-old brother when Yoshiki decided he wanted to turn around and return to his great-grandfather's home about 300 feet away, which his grandfather didn't stop him from doing. Shortly afterward, it was discovered he never made it back. Nearly 400 cops and other rescuers—as well as drones and search dogs, per Channel NewsAsia—were deployed to find Yoshiki, who doctors feared would succumb to dehydration and Japan's summer heat. Being credited with Yoshiki's discovery: 78-year-old volunteer Haruo Obata, who correctly guessed the boy was more likely to have climbed up the mountain rather than down it. Obata tells the Shimbun that as he called the boy's name around 6:30am Wednesday, he heard an "I'm here" and found the child, who "snatched a bag of candy" from Obata's hands as he held it out to him. Yoshiki was found to be dehydrated, with tick bites and scratches, but otherwise fine. "I'm so grateful my son returned safely," Yoshiki's mother told local TV. The boy's grandfather tells the Morning Post, "I apologize, as it was I who took my eyes off him."