Why does the number of missing persons fluctuate so much after the floods?

The number of people on that list of missing persons has dropped from 116 to 53 this afternoon. “That makes sense,” said Alain Remue, the head of the Missing Persons Unit of the federal police.

“People are constantly calling in, by people who are concerned about certain people. This can be loved ones, close relatives, but also neighbors or employers who are concerned about an employee they have not seen for a while.”

The names of all those people end up on a list, Remue explains. “Those names are systematically checked by six teams of the federal judicial police in Liège.”

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