Found Deceased UK - Nicola Bulley Last Seen Walking Dog Near River - St Michaels on Wyre (Lancashire) #15

[EvaP]

Hadn't really thought about the direction, but yeah you're right. Now after watching the full retracing video he was going away from the bench not towards it.

This retracing video is the best I've seen. They walked Nicola's exact route and times. I'm now even more convinced that Nicola made it back to the bench.

So he didn’t see her take the river path away from the bench/phone/dog which makes her timeline for disappearing that way onto Blackpool Ln smaller still?

 

[OckhamsRazor22]

Just watching the retracing video gives me the willies. That’s a very narrow path, and fenced in in both sides (like a cattle Shute to death). I would not feel comfortable alone on that path - esp. with the tall hedges and bramble on either side. Who was watching her six? Willow?

No way. There are no coincidences. Something seems to be very amiss and unsettling. If you walk this all the time, you have another disadvantage. Complacency. When nothing BAD ever happens, and you walk the route repeatedly, you drop your guard. It’s just human nature and physiology. Yet I also know complacency kills. Never relax in the saddle. (I adhere to the law of DTA: Don’t Trust Anyone).

 

[Allabouttrial]

First time poster. long...long time lurker. A thought just came to me fwiw. Many years ago I had a neighbour who hid bottles of vodka on the route she took to walk her dog. They were often secreted away in hedgerows. I suppose to hide them away from other people in the house?

Glad you decided to post .

Not saying it's impossible, but after seeing the recent video of her route then I would have to say I don't think so. The route is really open, a lot more so than I'd realised. Maybe in summer but in winter it's pretty barren.

 

[Bibitty]

Glad you decided to post .

Not saying it's impossible, but after seeing the recent video of her route then I would have to say I don't think so. The route is really open, a lot more so than I'd realised. Maybe in summer but in winter it's pretty barren.

Not sure if this has been discussed but in the Sky retracing video I was struck when the reporters said that the final 10 mins of the walk from last sighting at 9:10 to when phone was at the bench 9:20 - was v slow - that it wouldn’t have taken that long to walk that part - in the video they are holding back and talk to Ron at this point - anyone have any thoughts on any relevance of this?

 

[Mr X]

IMO it was curious they spent a while around the little brick building but never mentioned it. I see someone has poked a camera into it and there is a winch arrangement and a couple of ladders so as suggested before it probably is a water sampling station. IMO one thing which may have been overlooked is that someone lying on the top of it would be completely invisible to anyone in the area.

This IMO would be an ideal place to wait if you were going to kidnap someone. You could jump on them, scare them and they would probably follow instructions.

Only IMO but do hope police forensics have been all over that building including the large flat roof even if the inside does seem to be unused.

Someone did appear in the area during the filming but I'm assuming it was the sky news drone operator.

Around 38.45 in the film was an interesting time.

I'll put forward a slightly out of the box theory here. All JMO of course.

Crazy murderer waits on top of the brick shed and has a ladder. Jumps on the victim, does whatever then climbs back onto top of building and leaves body there. Walks off leaving phone on bench.

Reason that dog is not by the building is that the dog knows the perp and was running about when the grab happened so did not actually see it happening.

Perp comes back later in the dark to remove and dispose of body.

Like I say police WILL have crawled over every inch of that building so my theory is most probably incorrect.

26.55 shows the flat roof.

Who exactly was it that broke the panel on the window and when did it happen. IMO if my theory was correct it could have been the perp and the body could have been dropped into the hole immediatley below the window. The only problem with this is you would need to know exactly what was in there and there does not appear to be a useable entrance anywhere.

 

[Bibitty]

I have also thought whether something mentioned in that last meeting made her snap. More of something she didn't want to do and then it all felt too much.

I think that LP would have spoken with the boss to determine if there was any bad news at that meeting - and if there was they would have added this to their risk assessment and would also have declared it as one of the vulnerabilities when they issued their statement.

 

[Bogbacal2]

IMO, after R sees the phone, dog…and decides something doesn’t seem right, wouldn’t it be a natural instinct to look in the water, being that it is right there? It is about a 10(?) min. or so timeframe so if she had fallen anywhere near, she couldn’t have drifted far could she have?

 

[Bibitty]

There is nothing particularly weird about any of the details of Nicola’s work that I’ve seen, except that the out-of-hours meeting in Garstang was apparently slightly unusual, but it doesn’t seem exceptionally so. Being on a Teams meeting, messaging the boss…? All normal enough for anyone in “office” jobs who aren’t in the office.

I am regularly invited to briefings where I just listen in and don’t speak or contribute, sounds like the Friday call was one.

Where was it reported that the meeting with her boss was out of hours?

 

[BDL1960]

It’s very hard to trust a person who exaggerates and twists the truth.

Neither the police or PA called him in to search, like he claims. He put himself forward constantly, saying he would search for free but the police had ignored his offer. He also said he’d spoken to PA, who obviously accepted his offer of help, and when PA asked the police to allow PF to search they agreed, albeit reluctantly. The police didn’t want him on the scene, and even refused to give him confidential information possibly because he’s such a big blabbermouth.

On top of that, he kept changing his tune. One day he said he’d prove she hadn’t gone into the river. Then the next day he said he believed she had. He certaintly didn’t instil confidence.

He also suggests people can’t drown in that river, which is nonsense, especially as people have drowned in it. He also claims she couldn’t have gone over the weir, but other experts say people can do. And neither does he know if she walked 1 or 2 hundred years and jumped in ahead of the weir. From the way Willow was running between the bench and turnstile gate that sounds like NB left through that gate, but that’s just MOO and I could be wrong.

...and of course it's done no harm to the sales of his new book on underwater search.

 

[SLS001]

Long time lurker here too. I’ve been thinking about the welfare check on the 10th January. There have been mentions of brain fog caused by NB going through the menopause. Maybe she failed to show up somewhere (like missing school pick up) and this was concerning and people couldn’t get in touch with her so they contacted the police JMO. I’m not convinced she’s gone into the river, but the lack of any evidence to show a different reason for her going missing does point to that. It’s just a very sad situation.

 

[pineapple23]

Just watching the retracing video gives me the willies. That’s a very narrow path, and fenced in in both sides (like a cattle Shute to death). I would not feel comfortable alone on that path - esp. with the tall hedges and bramble on either side. Who was watching her six? Willow?

It's weird how we can all watch the same thing and come up with different perceptions. Thanks to the (presumably) drone footage, I was struck by how open much of it was. So if there was a chance meeting and an argument as some have speculated, there was a good chance the other person would have been spotted, if only on the route

 

[Bibitty]

Do we know if / how the local friends volunteer effort is ongoing?

Did they do there usual Friday roadside appeal for info / webcams yesterday?

Have they made any further public comment recently? Are they still mobilised to search etc?

 

[Miss_French]

Long time lurker here too. I’ve been thinking about the welfare check on the 10th January. There have been mentions of brain fog caused by NB going through the menopause. Maybe she failed to show up somewhere (like missing school pick up) and this was concerning and people couldn’t get in touch with her so they contacted the police JMO.

Then why would the police say "no-one was arrested"? Sounds more serious than NB with brain fog, IMO.

 

[pineapple23]

Possibly entirely coincidental and unrelated, but.... Please note, this may be difficult for some to view.

Yesterday, the Daily Mail released a random story about two friends falling into the driver, drunk, while walking their dog. It doesn't seem legitimate.

Drunk Dog Walkers Fall Over in Stream

The Times Scotland front page from yesterday has a Sturgeon resignation headline 'Dead in the Water' immediately adjacent to a photo of NB.

Is this for real?! The press playing games or entirely coincidental? Does Fleet Street know something we don't?

MOO.

Edited to correct dates.

Who knows whether it was just deliberate poor taste for the DM to run that story. As for the Times, imo justaposing the two was sloppy editing rather than hinting at some secret knowledge. I wonder if they have had any complaints?

 

[pineapple23]

Long time lurker here too. I’ve been thinking about the welfare check on the 10th January. There have been mentions of brain fog caused by NB going through the menopause. Maybe she failed to show up somewhere (like missing school pick up) and this was concerning and people couldn’t get in touch with her so they contacted the police JMO. I’m not convinced she’s gone into the river, but the lack of any evidence to show a different reason for her going missing does point to that. It’s just a very sad situation.

It was attended by police and health staff (links earlier in the thread) which sounds like they were responding to an incident, or at the least, serious concerns at that location.

 

[Mandalas]

Who knows whether it was just deliberate poor taste for the DM to run that story. As for the Times, imo it was sloppy editing rather than some strange conspiracy to juxtapose the two. I wonder if they have had any complaints?

I have removed / reported my original post as don't see that it adds any value to the discussion, and cannot myself verify the newspaper cover image.

 

[Bibitty]

Long time lurker here too. I’ve been thinking about the welfare check on the 10th January. There have been mentions of brain fog caused by NB going through the menopause. Maybe she failed to show up somewhere (like missing school pick up) and this was concerning and people couldn’t get in touch with her so they contacted the police JMO. I’m not convinced she’s gone into the river, but the lack of any evidence to show a different reason for her going missing does point to that. It’s just a very sad situation.

If she had failed to pick up from school the school would have PA and possibly other numbers to call. PA works from home.

Also why would the police turn up with additional health care professionals in this situation and why would they discuss arrests?

That incident was clearly very serious and complex.

Have the police referred themselves now for independent review re their handling of this visit ? Does that indicate they didn’t do enough (eg follow up?) or follow procedures during or after?

 

[Marie Bell]

If she had failed to pick up from school the school would have PA and possibly other numbers to call. PA works from home.

Also why would the police turn up with additional health care professionals in this situation and why would they discuss arrests?

That incident was clearly very serious and complex.

Have the police referred themselves now for independent review re their handling of this visit ? Does that indicate they didn’t do enough (eg follow up?) or follow procedures during or after?

No. The referral is routine and mandatory when the missing person (still not found) had any recent contact with police.

 

[x44]

Perhaps in their attempts to find out whose the phone was, they'd simply switched away from the Teams screen. I don't think it really matters whether the phone was locked or not, as NB was obviously gone by then.

I've never used Teams on a mobile
However it might be that the App like Sat Nav' App's do "holds" the phone unlocked and awake with the screen 'on' while the app is running in the foreground - ie on the screen, regardless of whether there is or not any interaction from the user of the phone with it.

 

[Petrocelli]

Not sure if this has been discussed but in the Sky retracing video I was struck when the reporters said that the final 10 mins of the walk from last sighting at 9:10 to when phone was at the bench 9:20 - was v slow - that it wouldn’t have taken that long to walk that part - in the video they are holding back and talk to Ron at this point - anyone have any thoughts on any relevance of this?

IMO I think as she started the return leg of her walk, she realised she didn’t want to go home and had had enough so was walking very slowly. Possibly something from the night before playing on her mind added to her other worries.

I think she staged the phone and lead, because of her knowledge of insurance policies and buy some time and went through the kissing gate turned left through the woods down to the weir and entered the water after that where it flows faster and is tidal. She knew Willow would be fine next to water and be found soon anyway.

She could therefore have been much further down the river than they initially estimated.