House of horrors

Bizarre news of the day: Austrian girl 'found' after 8 years. As incredible as it may be: a 10 year old girl that disappeared on her way to school in Vienna on March 2, 1998 was found again after she was able to escape her captor. Police were called when she was found staggering in a garden. The kidnapper, named in Austrian media as 44-year old Wolfgang Priklopil, had been chased by police earlier on Wednesday evening and his red BMW car was later found abandoned. The suspected kidnapper died after throwing himself in front of a train.

The story is to bizarre for words: the woman was abducted and held captive in a sealed garage at the house in Strasshof, in the Gaenserndorf area on Vienna's northeastern outskirts. Police have searched the garage, and say it looked like a dungeon. Austrian media report that the room had a cavity measuring four by three metres (yards), with an entrance measuring 50cm by 50cm. They believe it was blocked with a sound-proof safe whenever the kidnapper left the scene. A bed and bookshelf with children's books were reportedly also found there.

Few details of Wednesday's events have been made public. But the state broadcaster ORF carried remarks by Erich Zwettler of the Austrian federal police saying that the girl escaped from her captor when the door to her hiding place was open, and ran into a nearby garden where she told an elderly woman that her name was Natascha Kampusch and that she had been kidnapped. Although police have not identified the suspect, Austrian media have said he was 44-year-old Priklopil, described as a communications technician. The police had contact with the alleged kidnapper about three months after Kampusch disappeared in 1998 but that he had a "sturdy alibi" at the time.

Trying to imagine how she must have survided all those long years just sends shivers down my spine. Too bad the guy committed suicide.

Update: video of Natascha's dungeon