Paul Robert Stevenson
Paul Robert Stevenson
Paul's daughter Nikki
Paul Stevenson was last seen on the morning of Sunday 11 March 2012. At around 4am he left his Bundaberg QLD home intending to ride to Paradise Dam. His proposed route was not known. Paul was riding a black 1978 Honda CB750 motorcycle which has since been located 16kms east of Mt Perry township, near the Wonbah Winery, on the Gingin-Mt Perry Road. The bike was wedged into lantana, down an embankment off the road. There was no blood at the scene, the bike was only minimally damaged (scrapes and a broken indicator) but there were two snakes under the bike when it was lifted up. Paul's helmet was found next to the bike.
Extensive land and air searches of the surrounding area failed to locate Paul. Extensive inquiries have failed to provide any further information on Paul's whereabouts.
Visit the page for Paul at
www.facebook.com/MissingPaulStevensonBundaberg.
The Stevenson family are desperate for help in the search for
Paul Stevenson. The terrain where the searches have taken place is rugged and if
there is to be any hope of finding Paul and or gaining any resolution, people
are asked to keep searching this area.
The searches have taken place in the area around WONBAH WINERY ROAD VIA GINGIN-MtPERRY ROAD.
UPDATE 5.55am: GRAVE concerns are held for a 47-year-old Bundaberg man who was reported missing after he did not return from a motorbike ride near Biggenden on Sunday.
Paul Stevenson was believed to have gone riding near Paradise Dam, about 80km south-west of Bundaberg, on his black 1978 Honda motorbike with Queensland registration plate UQ113.
A ground search of all roads in the area was launched first thing yesterday, involving police officers, members of the SES and the AGL Action Rescue Helicopter.
Bundaberg Police Inspector Kev Guteridge said the full-day search failed to find any trace of Mr Stevenson, who is the president of the Western Suburbs Junior Rugby League club.
"Police are very concerned about his welfare," Insp Guteridge said.
Insp Guteridge said the search was stood down at last light, and was expected to resume first thing today.
AGL Action Rescue Helicopter's Dick Snell said the crew spent most of the day searching for the father-of-two near Paradise Dam before changing the search direction towards Gin Gin and Agnes Water late afternoon.
It is understood Mr Stevenson's family, including wife, Julie, hired a private helicopter to also aid in the search.
Mr Stevenson was believed to have been wearing a black leather jacket, a black full face helmet and possibly jeans.
Anyone who has information on the man's whereabouts is urged to call Bundaberg police on 4153 9111.
Tuesday, March 13, 2.05pm:
THE search for a missing Bundaberg man who did not return from a motorbike ride has been ramped up with the SES called in to aid the search team.
Bundaberg police Inspector Kev Guteridge said officers were conducting patrols on all roads around Paradise Dam, 80km south west of Bundaberg, where the man was believed to have gone riding.
Insp Guteridge said the AGL Action Rescue Helicopter was deployed at 8.30am to help with the search.
"Police are very concerned about his welfare," Insp Guteridge said.
The man was riding a black 1978 Honda motorbike with Queensland registration UQ113.
He was wearing a black leather jacket, a black full face helmet and possibly jeans.
Anyone who may have been riding in the area or know of the man's whereabouts, please call Bundaberg police on 4153 9111.
BREAKING 1.40pm: THE motorbike belonging to missing Bundaberg man Paul Stevenson has been located in bushland.
The AGL Action Rescue Helicopter spotted the black 1978 Honda motorbike during the search between Gin Gin and Mt Perry about 10.45am.
Pilot Dick Snell said the bike had been very difficult to see from both the air and ground.
"Our paramedic did a wonderful job spotting it," he said.
Mr Snell said the helmet was also seen next to the bike, which was found not far off the road near the Wonbah Winery.
Bundaberg Police Inspector Kev Guteridge said a land search was currently under way near where the bike was found.
"He's nowhere to be seen," he said.
It is not yet clear what condition the bike was in when it was found.
More to come.
THERE is still no trace of the Bundaberg man who disappeared after failing to return home from a motorbike ride, despite search teams locating his bike in bushland yesterday.
Paul Stevenson's bike and helmet were found a few metres from the Gin Gin-Mt Perry Rd shortly before 11am.
Mr Stevenson was reported missing early Monday after he did not return home from a motorbike ride he went on at 4am Sunday.
A full-scale search of Paradise Dam and surrounding areas was conducted on Monday and was resumed yesterday morning around Mt Perry and Miriam Vale.
The AGL Action Rescue Helicopter spotted the black 1978 Honda motorbike during the search between Gin Gin and Mt Perry about 10.45am.
Pilot Dick Snell said the bike had been particularly difficult to see from both the air and ground.
"Our paramedic did a wonderful job spotting it," he said.
Mr Snell said the helmet was also seen next to the bike, which was found not far off the road near the Wonbah Winery.
Bundaberg Police Inspector Kev Guteridge said a land search of the immediate area soon began.
"He's nowhere to be seen," he said.
Mr Stevenson's family made a tearful plea for assistance in finding the much-loved father and husband.
Daughter Nikki said it was not like her dad to not return home from a ride.
"He likes to explore - he loves the bush," she said at a press conference.
"He's not stupid on a bike but obviously accidents happen."
His wife, Julie, pleaded with anyone who may have seen her husband on that day, to come forward.
"Keep an eye out for him," she said through tears.
Last movements
AS THE trail for missing Bundaberg man Paul Stevenson goes cold, his family has become increasingly desperate to find him.
Friends and family have flown in from across the state to help scour bushland near Mt Perry for the father-of-two, who failed to return home from a motorbike ride early Sunday.
His black Honda motorbike and helmet were found just metres from the Gin Gin-Mt Perry Rd on Tuesday.
But extensive searches in the surrounding area failed to find any further trace of Mr Stevenson, with the search for him entering day four today.
Mr Stevenson's sister, Toni Somes, said it appeared her brother was headed towards Mt Perry when his bike crossed over a small concrete gutter and went down an embankment.
"There was no blood at the scene. (His bike) wasn't badly damaged," she said.
Mrs Somes, a journalist in Warwick, said her older brother's wallet and phone were believed to be on him.
"They weren't found at the scene," she said.
"There were a couple of snakes under the bike when they picked it up.
"There's not a lot more that we know."
Mrs Somes said her brother was known to go for Sunday rides without leaving many details of where he was going.
"If there's a message out here for anybody, please let your family know before you go out," she said.
The concerned sister said the five siblings and mum were trying to stay strong for Mr Stevenson's 16-year-old son, Tom.
"He's really struggling - he's been out here searching since Sunday," she said.
Mrs Somes said the family were in "awe" of the number of people who turned up to help search.
"The way the community came together to search for him, we are enormously grateful," she said.
Mrs Somes said Mr Stevenson was well known in the Gin Gin and Mt Perry communities, from his time working as a contract musterer and timber cutter.
"Some of these blokes worked with Paul in the '80s," she said.
Mrs Somes said the family was struggling emotionally and once again pleaded for public assistance.
"If anyone saw anything Sunday morning, it would be great if they could come forward," she said.
"We're pretty desperate to find him."
WHILE police continue making inquiries into the disappearance of Bundaberg man Paul Stevenson, volunteers at the Wonbah search site, near Mt Perry, have been stood down.
Bundaberg police Superintendent Rowan Bond said the search wrapped up about 3.30pm yesterday on day four.
"We believe we've exhausted everything we can in that particular area," he said. "We haven't called the search off.
"We'll spend (today) making other inquiries.
"It's still all systems go."
Supt Bond said the family of Mr Stevenson was "quite distraught" that he hadn't been seen since he left for a motorbike ride on Sunday.
"They're certainly not going to give up, and neither are we," he said.
"We continue to have very grave concerns for his safety."
Supt Bond said police were still appealing for public assistance and wanted to hear from those who may have information about the disappearance.
Anyone with information is urged to call Crime Stoppers on 1800333000 or police on 41539111.
A MISSING person poster for Bundaberg man Paul Stevenson will be distributed around the region in coming days.
Mr Stevenson did not return from a motorcycle ride early on the morning of Sunday, March 11.
His black Honda motorbike and helmet were found down an embankment off Gin Gin-Mt Perry Rd last Tuesday.
Mr Stevenson's son and daughter Tom and Nikki have started to distributed the posters around Bundaberg, Gin Gin and Mt Perry.
Mr Stevenson's sister Toni Somes said the family was hopeful the poster would help to unearth new information about his disappearance.
"As incredibly difficult as it was, Paul and Nikki distributed some of the posters around, pleading with the public as they did to help find their dad," she said.
"As Paul's family we remain incredibly distraught, but determined to continue to search until we bring him home."
Mrs Somes said the family believed Paul may have attempted to walk to a nearby friend's property after the accident.
"Unfortunately he didn't make it to the property and appears to have disappeared from the side of the road without a trace," she said.
The family have set up a Facebook page to appeal for information from the community and provide updates to friends and family.
Visit the page at www.facebook.com/MissingPaulStevensonBundaberg.
ANXIETY is the call to say your brother didn't make it home from a motorbike ride.
ANXIETY is the call to say your brother didn't make it home from a motorbike ride.
Hope is what you hold on to when 48 hours later a police helicopter locates his crashed road bike.
Despair is what engulfs you when hours, days and weeks pass and you still haven't found him.
It is now a hellish 20 days since my brother, Paul Stevenson, disappeared without a trace from a road west of Bundaberg.
This is the story no journalist ever wants to write from a first-hand experience.
Paul is a son, a father, a husband, an uncle and a bloke with strong ties to his community.
In Bundaberg, where he has lived for close to a decade, he is president of his local junior footy club, Western Suburbs. He is a senior first aid officer, an experi- enced diesel mechanic and a dedicated family man.
The latter is why it is so hard to accept that he has been missing since Sunday, March 11, when he failed to return to home after an early morning motorbike ride.
Two days later the crew of a police rescue helicopter located Paul's 1978 Honda CB750 down an embankment on the Mt Perry-Gin Gin Rd about 100km inland from Bundaberg.
Witnesses later came forward to say they saw a man matching my brother's description walking east along the bitumen road about 600m from the crash site about 1pm on March 11. No one has reported seeing him since.
He hasn't used his mobile phone or his bank accounts, called family or friends; he has quite literally disappeared without a trace.
Where does a family, desperate to find someone they love, start to look?
We drove north to be with his distraught wife, Julie, and children Tom, 16, and Nikki, 19, and chartered a helicopter to join the search.
After police located his road bike we joined SES teams and with Paul's friends and workmates spent days crawling down embankments, up ridges and through lantana.
Three days later when police wound up the ground search a group of my brother's most loyal mates stayed on and with footy club members and city friends we kept looking.
In the long days that followed we sought out Aboriginal trackers, door-knocked houses, travelled dirt roads, phoned strangers and pinned up hundreds of missing posters.
When those actions failed to produce results, exhausted and despairing, we consulted clairvoyants, psychics and private investigators.
For what it is worth, those in touch with the spirit world advised us not to give up. There was never any risk we would.
Now three weeks later we are struggling with two scenarios: Did we leave him out there somewhere? Did we not search hard enough or thoroughly enough or in the right place in the rugged terrain of the Wonbah Range where he was last seen.
Or did he just leave us?
TWO years ago, Paul Stevenson went for a ride on his bike and never came back. But this little girl has hope that one day her pa will walk back through the door.
SIX years ago today, Nikki Stevenson was watching footy and chatting with her dad, Paul.
He'd go for a morning ride on his 1978 Honda CB750 motorcycle before attending a meeting at 9am, but it would be a meeting he'd never make.
That day, his phone rang out. Then it rang out again, and again. His family knew something was very wrong.
Two days later, his "pride and joy" motorbike was found moderately damaged down an embankment on Mt Perry-Gin Gin Rd, along with his helmet.
There were some scrapes on the bike and an indicator had been busted, but no signs of a high speed crash. There was no blood.
With Paul being a seasoned motorbike rider, there's no way he would have taken the bends and winds of the road carelessly, according to his daughter.
A couple of snakes were hiding beneath the bike, but there were no clues and no certainties other than one - Paul, a beloved father and popular community member - had vanished.
He'd planned to ride to Paradise Dam that morning.
Random adventures were nothing unusual for the diesel mechanic who would often venture off and come home excitedly recounting the places he'd explored.
"It was common for him to do that sort of stuff," daughter Nikki says.
"My husband's family live at Mt Perry Rd, you see that traffic going past and I just wonder how something like that has happened and no one has seen him.
"What we covered in the search was crazy and number of of volunteers was crazy, you just think, how could anything be missed?"
According to the Coroner, Paul has passed away. But even after holding a memorial service, his family can't find peace.
"It's just at a point where we need answers," Nikki said.
"We've all got to move on with our lives, you've still got to move on but you can't grieve.
"Over the past six years other than the initial search and trying to uncover what happened to dad we had a couple of sightings in the first few weeks but we've basically hit a big block we can't get around."
Nikki has been left in limbo, forced to consider fates from a stroke or heart attack to more sinister events, even torture.
"Nothing specifically leads to one thing," she said.
"I try to keep an open mind and you try and think has an accident happened or foul play - there's always bad scenarios with everything.
"No matter how much you push it away, there's always different scenarios."
With no action on any of his accounts since he went missing, Nikki is calling on the public to come forward with any small piece of information.
"If people even found anything of dad's like his cards or wallet it would help," she said.
"All we're after is answers, even small information to spark answers.
"At the moment we've got absolutely nothing."
The pain of his disappearance hit particularly hard last year when Nikki got married and her father wasn't there.
"He was the kind of dad who would absolutely go above and beyond," she said.
"He was always involved in everything we did as kids.
"We couldn't have asked for a better dad. I always wonder what dad would have been like with his granddaughters."
Nikki, now a mum of two, lives on a rural cattle station and says she wants people to stop and think how they would feel if it was their parent who had vanished.
"If anyone knows anything just come forward, it's all anonymous, no one needs to know," she said.
"Hug your loved ones a little bit tighter because you never know when it's the last time."
Paul Stevenson was 47 when he went missing six years ago, and was seen around 4am that morning getting fuel before taking off on an unknown route to Paradise Dam.
He was wearing a black leather jacket and a black full face helmet and possibly jeans.
Anyone with information can call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
NIKKI Whelan can't rest. It's been seven years since she saw her father and, in her words, "as time goes by it's only going to get harder".
"But because you can't deal with them you've got to go on with everyday life, it's just horrible."
The diesel mechanic, popular community member and much-loved family man told his family he'd be setting off on a ride towards Paradise Dam in the early hours of the morning.
His plan was simple. A scenic bike ride, a quick shower at home, then a meeting he was scheduled to attend at 9am.
But his family knew something wasn't right when he failed to make his meeting. Then calls to his phone rang out one after another.
It wasn't like him.
It would be two days before any sign was found.
His 1978 Honda CB750 motorbike was discovered down an embankment, wedged in amongst the lantana.
There were a couple of snakes under the bike. There was no sign of blood.
An indicator on his "pride and joy" was damaged but there were no signs of a high-speed crash.
His helmet was found near the bike.
With Paul being a seasoned motorbike rider, there's no way he would have taken the bends and winds of the road carelessly, according to his daughter.
A four-day search with two helicopters and more than 100 volunteers combing "kilometres and kilometres" of bushland couldn't find Paul.
"My husband and I have had discussions and the biggest thing for me is how could Dad not be there?" Mrs Whelan asks.
Another mystery that baffles Mrs Whelan is the fact that no one has come forward with any significant piece of the puzzle.
The place where his bike was found - Mt Perry-Gin Gin Rd - is a fairly busy country road.
"My mother and father-in-law live a few kilometres from where he went missing," Mrs Whelan said, revealing that she had sat and watched the traffic just to see how many people pass by. A lot.
"It would be near impossible for someone not to have seen anything," she said.
"But there's just been nothing."
At a point where she is desperate for answers, Mrs Whelan is calling on anyone who was in the area on that day to think about not only the abnormal, but the normal things they remember that might finally crack the case.
"We're sort of at a roadblock and we don't know where to go because we need some sort of evidence but we don't have that," she told the NewsMail.
Paul's family has tried everything, even consulting psychics for answers, but as time goes on, their resolve wears thin.
"It gets you down and it gets you exhausted," Mrs Whelan said. "It does toy with your emotions."
While foul play is one of the many scenarios that plays on her mind, she can't think of anyone who would wish harm on her dad.
"He was one of those people who everyone really liked," Mrs Whelan said.
"I'm still very much a believer, I fully believe that someone knows something.
"We need answers, it doesn't matter what the answers give us, we just need those answers now."
Paul's case is still an open investigation.
"For the police to be able to do anything we need people to come forward," Mrs Whelan said.
"Someone might think something is nothing but it could be the one big break we actually need."
"I still do believe at the end of the day there's someone out there who knows something."
Paul Stevenson was 47 when he went missing and was seen about 4am on March 13, 2012, getting fuel at a Bundaberg service station before taking off on an unknown route to Paradise Dam.
He was wearing a black leather jacket, a black full-face helmet and possibly jeans.
Anyone with information can call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
