A hunt for a British teenage tourist who went missing in the Romanian mountains last year has gone cold, with rescue teams said a fresh search had turned up no clues.
British visitor George Smyth, 18, vanished on Nov. 23, 2025, while solo hiking through forests in the Bucegi Mountains in Transylvania near Bran Castle which is associated with the fictitious Count Dracula.
A new search was recently launched after the snow covering the mountains melted enough to allow rescuers to access previously unreachable areas. However, it provided no further signs of Smyth.
“Unfortunately, as a result of the operation, no clues or elements were identified that would lead to finding the missing young man,” a spokesperson for local mountain rescue service Salvamont Brasov said, according to BBC News.
There are still a couple of stretches in the mountains where there is snow, with the search expected to resume in those areas in the coming weeks when it melts, the rescue team said.
A public appeal has been issued for help.
“Please pay close attention to the route and its surroundings, and contact us immediately if you notice objects, tracks, or any other elements that may be connected to the missing person or that could help identify the area they may be in,” the spokesperson said.
Smyth went missing during a hike to Bran Castle, home to the fictional title character Count Dracula in Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel, “Dracula.”
Rescue services described his last known location as a “very isolated and hard-to-access mountain area” .
Smyth left his student digs at University of Bristol in southwest England without telling his family before going on his solo hike in Romania
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