Missing Woman Nicola Bulley 7

[LoveMAFS]

The chat appears to have gone quiet today after the last thread filled up, so I'm making a new one for anyone who wants to come together whilst we all hold our breath hoping for a good outcome.

I don't think it's overly unusual to leave it but mention it later to someone, I doubt the first thing most people should jump to in a quiet, small village would be something nefarious. Probably assumed someone had popped for a wee or to find something and would be back. I also don't think they've said they knew it was Nicolas but instead recognised the people on the screensaver on the phone and called the school? This could be for many reasons in my opinion- perhaps they phoned Nicolas number (the person who went back and called the school knew her allegedly) and the phone rang but they didn't have Paul's number, perhaps they phoned the school as didn't have either and they got through to Paul? Police will have looked into this and will have more detail, but doesn't sound overly weird to me.

Why are people speculating about Paul's face?! The police will have looked at him. Why does it matter what's his face looks like? The police aren't thick.

By them do you mean Nicola and her family?

We now know that the police have been aware of them for some time (CCTV footage requested earlier etc) so presumably have not been able to rule them out of the investigation or they would already have made a statement saying they have been traced and ruled out. Same with the red van presumably.

Isn't it at Larbreck where the family have a van? That's a few miles away.

Where does the information that Paul and Nicola rent a caravan come from?

Wasn't that based on the untrue rumour of his business being based on the caravan park?

I couldn't work out what the poster was trying to say.

I think if any mistakes have been made it’s been in the search for the body. People saying she’d be found etc are assuming there’s been no human error (or equipment error) in where and when different parts of the river have been searched. I read about a drowned man they missed 5 times till he was eventually found!

Is it possible that she was sat on the bench, Willow got into trouble-left her phone on the bench and picked up the harness to go to Willow.

At that point, she might have seen a man she didn't like the look of coming towards her, so she dropped the harness and walked quickly or ran further along the river towards the weir where she fell or was pushed in.

It would account for the phone on the bench and the harness on the bank. She was there but moved quickly to get away from someone she was uneasy about.

One of their old businesses was registered to a premises close by to a different caravan park that's a few miles away. People have put 2 and 2 together to get to 5 and are unfairly speculating that the witness is unreliable and has ulterior motive even though a) the premises was a residential dwelling not on any caravan park and b) it's a completely different park altogether.

You cannot keep poultry outside anymore. It's a legal requirement to keep them indoors. So she doesn't have free range poultry around the park, and if she does she is breaking the law.

www.gov.uk/government/news/avian-influenza-housing-order-to-be-introduced-across-england

Yeah I wouldn't either. I certainly wouldn't miss an appointment for a random dog especially when it seemed the wonder was probably nearby. You know what this country is like, if it was an NHS or dental appointment she might have been waiting months or years for it.

I don't know the area can some one explain which caravan park - They have the rented caravan at? And which c park is the business address at?

A lot underestimate how challenging it is to search even what appears to be a relatively shallow and slow moving body of water. Sonar as used by PF isn't really designed for rivers and although adds value still has limitations, hence human error being possible as for many areas he still had to have divers go in to move stuff about to enable the scan- it also can't travel through some vegetation etc. The police units do have some brilliant kit and search divers are highly qualified- but as you say, human error is still possible. Personally I believe she is in the water but didn't necessarily enter at the bench area.

I explained it to you two days ago.

All this case says to me is that if you abduct someone next to a body of water, the police are likely to just treat it as a drowning.

I've been thinking similar @ofwarren I've had mixed experiences of Lancashire Police down the years but no reason to think they're completely incompetent so just hope there has been more going on behind the scenes to justify their approach. Otherwise Nicola, and all the women of Lancashire, have been completely let down by those supposed to protect us.

I agree.
Earlier in this or a previous thread there was a video showing the route across the bridge, through the gate and showing the bench too.
I'm not familiar with the area at all but was immediately struck by how close the bench is to the gate, and how overgrown/concealed the path between the bridge and the gate is. Far less open than I'd imagined from the aerial shots. Although this video might have been taken in summer when the greenery is much denser.
The proximity of the bench and water gives me the impression that Nicola could have been just reaching the gate to go home and naturally would want to put Willow's harness back on before going through the gate. She could either have dropped her phone or placed in on the bench to have two hands free to put the harness back on. The fact that the harness was found halfway between the bench and the water could be explained by her approaching Willow to put the harness on and at this point a distraction of some sort happened.

They haven't rented a caravan. On companies house a previous business was registered to an address close to a different caravan park which is a few miles down the road- but friends have said it was in fact a cottage they rented and not a caravan on the park itself. The owner of that park is different anyway and there's nothing to suggest they have property there still. People are making all sorts of assumptions.

Why the attitude to a question @pigsinoodies ??

Totally different village

They have been looking into leads throughout and are working with a highly specialised missing persons unit, the amount of resource assigned to this is impressive- including detectives and other actively looking at other possibilities. If they were convinced it was the river and weren't considering anything else then sure but nothing suggests that's the case

Yes. I always think of the kids bathtime when I know a toy etc is on the bottom and can never find it! Notoriously difficult to search the river I’m sure and even the sonar guy said any dense areas of vegetation need to be searched manually as sonar can’t “see” through. Add to this as you say the fact she may have been over weir before the search commenced either by entry point/current/swimming etc and it’s needle in haystack time!

Now this is a really good point that I'd not thought of.
I've seen a few people saying 'maybe willow was bothering her chickens' but she couldn't have, for this reason.

The account of how Willow, the phone and harness were found are confusing. From what I can understand, she said she tied Willow up with some string that was already attached to her collar, is that right? Why would a dog have string attached to their collar? Normally you would tie your dog with its lead, surely?

Because I actually explained it to you two days ago! And you could have researched it yourself in two minutes anyway.