Runaway teen’s dad searches for son

MOUNTAIN LAKES — A 15-year-old Morris County boy remained missing despite a reported sighting in Ohio.

Thomas Kolding, who went missing just before Halloween after an argument with his parents over his grades, left his Mountain Lakes home on his bike and made his way to the Denville NJ Transit station, where started his journey on board a train into Newark's Broad Street Station. Police said he then went on to Penn Station in New York. Surveillance video captured him on the platform at the Walter Rand Transportation Center in Camden last weekend.

His father Nicolai Kolding wrote on his Facebook page that he spent Friday and Saturday trying to trace his son's steps, and found another image of him after crossing the Ben Franklin Bridge on foot into Philadelphia.

"We have new insights but no hard clues," Nicolai Kolding wrote. He is also not hopeful that a reported sighting in Miami Township, Ohio (Montgomery County) will pan out.

"Police are taking every possible sighting seriously but the facts that I am aware of make this seem very unlikely to me," Nicolai Kolding wrote, adding that he is taking his personal search "south" along "travel routes."

Nicolai Kolding also shared his thoughts about using Facebook to communicate with his son.

"While we as parents keep trying all ways to communicate with him, I'd like to ask that anyone reading this ask Thomas's peers (whether here in Mtn. Lakes or anywhere) to write and share in a way and on a platform that makes them comfortable (several have suggested we tag everything with #thomaskolding)," the father wrote. "It could be about this 'case' specifically or the broader issue of teenage struggles and the pressures felt. What do we as parents need to hear from them (I've asked myself this question a lot lately — what was he trying to say that I didn't hear)?"

He hopes that other teens who hear of his son's disappearance might be able to offer some advice about why Thomas left.

Thomas is 5 feet 3 inches tall and weighs 115 pounds. He's been carrying a blue Adidas backpack and might be wearing a camouflage jacket.

Contact reporter Dan Alexander at Dan.Alexander@townsquaremedia.com or via Twitter @DanAlexanderNJ.

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