The mother of a Tasmanian girl who went missing in the bush has spoken out for the first time since her daughter was found.
Shayla Phillips’ mother broke her silence over the horrifying 48 hours in a Facebook update on Friday night.
Bianca Page thanked the officials and volunteers who worked to find for her missing four-year-old.
More than 100 personnel from Tasmania Police, the Police Drone Unit, State Emergency Service, Westpac Rescue Helicopter, specialist dogs, rescue crews from interstate as well as community members joined in the search for Shayla.
“I just want to thank everyone from the bottom of my heart with everything I have that I am currently sitting here with my precious baby girl with a few bruises, scratches, bites and an urine infection after spending over 48 hours alone in the bush,” Ms Page posted.
“The messages I received from everybody, your thoughts and prayers were all so overwhelming, I seriously honestly cannot thank you enough.
“#ForeverGreatful.”
Along with the post was a photo of Shayla sleeping next to her mother.
Dozens of family and friends commented on the post, wishing well for Shayla and the mother of two.
“This is by far the best post I have ever seen, your baby girl is such a warrior,” one person said.
“By far the best post, so glad you have her back safely in your arms hun, you’re one strong, brave, amazing mum,” another read.
“One tough little cookie just like her mumma! Best news ever,” a third posted.
“So happy you have ya baby girl back it was so stressful for a lot of people,” a fourth commented.
The little girl with long brown curly hair was last seen at around 2.30pm on Wednesday in the backyard of a neighbour’s Stormlea Rd property in Stormlea while playing with their two dogs.
When Ms Page went to check on her daughter she couldn’t find the girl and a frantic search ensued.
Tasmania police held concerns for her welfare as they entered the second day of the search but she was located in a densely wooded and hilly area near Halls Rd by an SES ground search party just before 4pm Friday.
She was then taken to hospital for medical assessment.
“It seems like she had been lying down and stuck her head up and she was seen,” Inspector Gavin Hallett said on Friday.
“It was the right place at the right time, had the SES volunteer being looking to the left and not the right we could have still been doing the search.
“We’re dealing with a four year old girl. She wasn’t going to come to us, we had to find her,” Inspector Hallett said.
“We had to do that crawling on hands and knees to locate her, and that’s what the SES did.”
Prior to her being found, Inspector Hallet said Shayla was a “very healthy, happy young child” who liked to play hide and seek, and ruled out suspicious activity as the reason for her disappearance.
“There have been occasions where they haven’t been able to locate her and has been absent for about 15 minutes but this is obviously a lot longer than that,” he said.
