Police believe missing Olympic skater may have flown abroad

Police believe missing speed skater Sven Roes may have travelled abroad without telling his family after his car was found parked at Schiphol airport.

Team-mates put out appeals on social media for the 26-year-old Roes on Sunday after nothing had been heard from him for 24 hours.

He was last seen filling his car, a Mitsubishi ASX, at a petrol station in Muiden on Saturday afternoon and last made contact by phone a few hours later.

The vehicle has now been traced to the P3 long-stay car park at Schiphol. Police earlier confirmed Roes had been reported missing but would not say if they were treating his disappearance as a missing person’s inquiry.

The Dutch skating union KNSB said it was shocked to learn the news and said it hoped there would “quickly be positive news”, while Olympic skaters such as Jens van ’t Wout and Xandra Velzeboer shared a post on Instagram appealing for information.

Roes, from Gytsjerk in Friesland, competed in the individual 1500m and the relay at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, but missed this year’s games because of a hip injury. He also won a silver medal in the relay at the 2022 world championships.