Major Nicola Bulley search update as police hunt underneath bridge seven miles from where mum vanished
POLICE are today focusing the search for Nicola Bulley underneath a bridge around seven miles from where she vanished.
The missing mum, 45, disappeared after dropping her children off at school in St Michael’s on Wyre, Lancashire, on Friday January 27.
Since then there has been no trace of the mum-of-two, leaving her family in agony despite extensive searches.
But today police have been seen in a boat underneath the Shard bridge.
It comes after the search for Nicola moved to Fleetwood, Morecambe Bay, yesterday amid the possibility she was swept 20 miles downriver to the sea.
The bridge that was searched today is around halfway between the sea and the village where Nicola was last seen.
Officers scoured Morecambe Bay yesterday as it emerged she was last spotted nearly two hours before police were called.
Police are also probing reports of a “shabby and suspicious” red van near where Nicola Bulley disappeared.
The vehicle was spotted close to the mum’s walking route on the morning she went missing.
It was seen parked in a lane — a few hundred yards from the school where Nicola, 45, had dropped off her young children.
A man in his 50s described the van as a high-sided Renault or Transit in a faded red.
The witness said: “It was a shabby looking van, an older model, the kind you can live or work in.
“It was on a quiet lane near a barn, with a couple of houses dotted around.
“Obviously, I don’t know whether this van is related to Nicola’s disappearance. All I know is that something grabbed my attention. I felt compelled to tell police about it.
“Even though it was down the road, as the crow flies it’s quite close to where Nicola was last seen.”