Search for Jay Slater in Tenerife SHUT DOWN by police as officers give up on finding teenager

Police have ended their search near the mountain village of Masca for missing Jay Slater. However, police said the case “remains open”, awaiting any additional information that could help locate Jay.

The Civil Guard announced today that the search, which lasted almost fifteen days, had ended, with the help of sniffer dogs, a helicopter and mountain rescue experts. They said officers would continue to follow up on any reports or other information that came to them – but the active work that had been going on since June 17, when the 19-year-old apprentice mason was reported missing, would now cease.

Confirmation of this dramatic development came less than 24 hours after a “last push” operation involving around thirty police officers, firefighters and civil protection as well as a handful of volunteers failed to find any trace from Oswaldtwistle, 19, in Lancashire.

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A Civil Guard spokeswoman said today: “The search operation is now over, although the case remains open.”

A well-placed source added: “The daily operation taking place in and around Masca, near where Jay was last seen, has come to an end. If information comes in that warrants further research, it will be taken into account.

“I understand Jay's parents have been informed of what is clearly a major development. Nothing relevant was found in yesterday's large-scale search.”

Jay was last seen by a resident of Masca, northwest Tenerife, shortly after 8 a.m. on June 17, as he walked north along the road out of the village after stopped to ask him for directions. His phone rang for the last time near a viewpoint where search teams gathered yesterday to begin the final day of the operation.

His friend Lucy Law said Jay called her shortly after he was last seen to say he was thirsty and had no water and only one percent battery on his phone. The Civil Guard says the “parallel” investigation by police investigators, about which it does not share information, continues despite the suspension of “visible” searches in the mountains of Masca and its surroundings.