Abandoned toddler is united with Australian relatives and issued with emergency passport as the heartbreaking search for her mother continues in Mexico
- Adelynn Shanks, two, found wandering alone in Cancun on Sunday evening
- Her mother Tahnee Shanks and father Jorge Aguirre Astudillo are missing
- Adelynn is now under the care of her grandmother and uncle who flew from Aus
- Family fear the worst for Ms Shanks who they haven’t heard from in days
An abandoned toddler who was found wandering barefoot and alone at a church in Mexico has been reunited with Australian relatives.
The desperate search remains for two-year-old Adelynn’s mother Tahnee Shanks, 32, who was reported missing with the child’s father Jorge Aguirre Astudillo.
Little Adelynn was spotted outside the chapel in Cancun on Sunday evening but is reportedly now in the care of her Brisbane grandmother Leanne and uncle Ben Shanks who flew from Australia to help search for Ms Shanks.
Abandoned toddler Adelynn Shanks, found wandering barefoot and alone at a church in Mexico, has been reunited with her Australian grandmother Leanne and uncle Ben Shanks
Adelyn had previously been cared for by Mexican child welfare authorities before her relatives arrived. She has also now received an emergency Australian passport, Nine News reported.
Ms Shanks’ brother Daniel said ‘three eyewitnesses’ saw Mr Astudillo leave his daughter Adelynn Shanks outside the Chapel of the San Archangel.
Daniel Shanks told the ABC that his sister, who is from Queensland’s Whitsundays, claimed she was on a vacation with her family in a small fishing village with poor reception but something felt off.
‘I’m assuming I was talking to him (Astudillo),’ he said.
Two-year-old Adelynn is now under the care of Australian relatives after she was found alone at a church in Cancun as her parents are reported missing
Ms Shanks had been holidaying around the Yucatan peninsula and was set to return to Australia after her relationship broke down with her partner Mr Astudillo.
The distraught sibling said Ms Shanks had stopped using social media days before she went missing.
Mr Shanks is unable to travel to Mexico himself because he is unvaccinated.
‘Look, it is very out of character, she is always on social media, she is always posting photos of her and Addie constantly, it is a constant stream of it, so for her to drop off, we knew something was wrong,’ Mr Shanks told Sunrise on Friday.
‘For this to happen is just tragic and heartbreaking. I haven’t slept for three days, you can probably tell and I am just exhausted.’
Tahnee Shanks (pictured right) had been traveling with her ex-partner Jorge Aguirre Astudillo (middle) and their daughter (left) in Mexico before she was reported as missing
Tahnee Shanks and Adelynn were due to return to Australia in June. The two-year-old was found by neighbours at the Chapel of the San Archangel (pictured)
Tahnee’s two-year-old daughter Adelynn was found wandering the streets late at night
His comments came as further details emerged about how the two-year-old was found.
An urgent message posted to Facebook alerted the local community in the state of Yucatán that the girl had bizarrely been found.
Mr Shanks said his niece was ‘dumped’ at a church in the Mexican tourist town late at night and was found wandering the streets.
As for his sister, she sent photos of the beaches they were visiting but ‘next minute nothing from her’.
He has offered a $5,000 reward for his sister’s safe return and has spent the last few days dealing with Mexican and Australian authorities
The last known photos of Ms Shanks and Mr Astudillo show them in Las Coloradas, Yucatán, 93 miles from where their daughter was found in Cancún on Mexico’s tropical southern tip.
One of the pictures shows Ms Shanks standing on the flatbed of a pickup truck and holding Adelynn with the beach in the distance.
Ms Shanks has no family in Mexico with her, but is normally active on social media. However, her family hasn’t heard from her in several days.
Jorge Aguirre Astudillo has not been seen since May 2 when he was with Australian native Tahnee Shanks, the mother of his two-year-old daughter. A missing person’s report was filed in Quintana Roo on Tuesday
A law enforcement official (right) holds Adelynn in his arms after she was found outside a Cancún church on Monday
Australian mother Tahnee Shanks shared with her family photos of her beach outing to Los Cuyos in Yucatán, Mexico, before she and the father of the two-year-old daughter went missing
Daniel has been trying to contact Mr Astudillo, who drives a white Toyota Tundra.
Daily Mail Australia doesn’t suggest that the ex-partner is involved in her disappearance.
A police public appeal for information about Ms Shanks’ whereabouts have been widely shared on both sides of the world.
Daniel Shanks said his sister had ended her relationship with Mr Astudillo and was weeks away from heading home back to Australia with her daughter in June.
Ms Shanks moved eight years ago from Australia to Merida, Mexico. She split from her partner a year after Adelynn was born.
‘She would have been home months ago,’ Daniel Shanks told ABC.
‘She thought she could get home easily, but America had shut down visas for Mexican-born people for a period because of Covid. She’s had to go and get an Australian citizenship and passport for Addy to try and divert around that issue.’
Witnesses say they saw a man pass Adelynn to a stranger in front of a church in the 220 Quintana Roo district.
Another brother, Benjamin Shanks, told 7News he had received a call on Tuesday from his sister’s former Australian boyfriend who had originally lived with her when they travelled to Mexico.
The man told him that a video was circulating on Mexican social media pages of a young girl found outside of a Cancún chapel.
He watched the video and the Mackay-based Shanks family recognised the girl as their niece and connected it with Ms Shanks’ inactive social media accounts.
Australian mother Tahnee Shanks (pictured with her ex-partner Jorge Aguirre Astudillo) has gone missing in Mexico
Tahnee Shanks’ family raised the alarm after they were made aware of photos being circulated of little Adelynn wandering Cancún alone late at night
Tahnee Shanks’ family insists she would never leave her little girl, who turned two last November
Ms Shanks had been living in Yucatán capital of Merida. She was waiting to receive her toddler’s passport and had booked plane tickets to arrive in Australia on June 22.
The Shanks family and friends are fearing the worst.
‘She’s never off social media and she would never leave that girl. That’s the scariest thing,’ Ben Shanks told the outlet.
‘We know Tahnee wouldn’t leave that girl on her own.’
Concerned friends also hold grave fears for Ms Shanks.
‘She is a very dedicated mother and would never abandon her daughter. Something serious had to happen for the little girl to find herself alone,’ a family friend wrote.
Mexico Police have launched a desperate search for missing Australian Tahnee Shanks
Tahnee Shanks (pictured middle) was on vacation with her ex-partner (right) and her daughter (left) when she vanished in Mexico, a continent away from any of her family
Tahnee Shanks’ mother and brother are on their way to Mexico to find out what happened to her
Tahnee Shanks, 32, (pictured right) originally from the Whitsundays, Queensland, is missing in Mexico where she was on vacation
The devoted mum’s social media pages are full of happy snaps of her little girl.
The mother had been traveling the world since she was 18 and describes herself on social media as a ‘Happy Hippy Ginger Ninja meeting around the world one country at a time.’
Before she went overseas, she worked in Australia as an assistant nurse looking after the elderly, which she described as a rewarding career.
‘The travel bug bit me in 2010 taking me on my first 18 month journey through Asia and parts of Europe volunteering and couch surfing my way across the country,’ the freelance writer wrote on a travel blog for the Whitsundays.
Shanks returned home and saved for two years and then headed back overseas traveling through Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia and the United States before settling in Mexico.
She is described as having a fair complexion, and has red hair, light brown eyes, 5 feet 4 inches tall, thin build and has a distinctive tattoo along her right thigh.
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