ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Authorities plan to start searching the Mississippi River in an effort to find a missing University of St. Thomas student on Thursday.
Nineteen-year-old Daniel Zamlen has been missing since early Sunday morning after he left a party in St. Paul.
Police plan to put a boat in the river Thursday morning as students and volunteers continue to go door-to-door to find any clues about Zamlen's disappearance.
Search dogs picked up a scent on the bluffs above the Mississippi river Wednesday but there is still no sign of Zamlen, who is a freshman at St. Thomas.
Volunteers who turned out to search for Zamlen were asked to focus on the banks of the Mississippi River, and the neighborhood along Mississippi River Boulevard between St. Clair Avenue and the University campus. Police had hoped to launch a search boat on the Mississippi, but spring currents made conditions too dangerous.
Zamlen, who turned 19 Wednesday, is diabetic and uses an insulin pump. He has not been heard from since he left a party and was talking to friends on his cell phone shortly before 3 a.m. Sunday, April 5. At the time, he was believed to have been walking along Mississippi River Boulevard near St. Clair Avenue.
A search operations center, which had been located in the Fireside Room of Koch Commons earlier this week, was re-opened in Room 154 of Murray-Herrick Campus Center.
Students and community members who can assist with the search are asked to report to the Fireside Room of Koch Commons from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Wednesday, April 8. They will receive further instructions there. This is the same place where more than 550 student volunteers met and received search assignments on Monday.
Students are not being asked to skip classes, but to plan searching around their class schedules.
Daniel Meuwissen, director of Public Safety at the University, said volunteers and police together will be going house to house along Mississippi River Boulevard today. They will ask homeowners for permission to look for Zamlen anywhere he might have used for shelter.
Meuwissen and St. Paul police continue to ask students and community members to stay away from the banks of the Mississippi River. In addition to the safety reasons, they fear that unauthorized searchers could destroy possible clues and hinder the investigation. Law enforcement will carefully search of the steep banks and bluffs along the river using special equipment and tracking dogs.
While authorities were searching along the river Tuesday, dozens of St. Thomas students and other volunteers fanned out throughout the city to post approximately 1,000 flyers in businesses and other locations. At Tuesday night's Minnesota Wild hockey game, news of Zamlen's disappearance was announced to 18,000 fans and his picture was shown on the arena's electronic scoreboard.
The campus community is encouraged to check the UST Cares Web site for information about Zamlen. You can reach the page by clicking the button at the bottom of the St. Thomas home page.
As announced to the campus community since Sunday, anyone with information is urged to contact the university's Public Safety Department at (651) 962-5555.
Wednesday was Dan's 19th birthday. He lives in Brady Residence Hall and is the son of Dale and Sally Zamlen of Eveleth.
(Copyright 2009 by KARE. All Rights Reserved.)
