'Our dogs are trained to find people, both alive or dead.'
Search dogs are being flown in from the Netherlands to help look for missing Jay Slater in Tenerife, his family have claimed.
The Dutch Signi Zoekhonden, often deployed in the aftermath of natural disasters, were ‘confident’ as they set of for their five-and-a-half day mission this Sunday.
It’s been nearly a month since the 19-year-old from Oswaldtwistle, Lancashire, vanished after leaving an Airbnb on the Spanish island on June 17.
He had travelled there, near the village of Masca, with two men after a rave on the Veronicas Strip in Playa de las Américas, a 40-minute drive away.
After leaving the holiday let that morning, he was seen walking north into the mountains in the opposite direction to where he was staying in Los Cristianos.
Jay later called friend and holiday companion Lucy Mae Law to say he was lost, thirsty and running out of phone battery.
No one has seen him since, and an official search effort by Spanish police and mountain rescue was called off after two weeks with no sign of him.
Although some of Jay’s friends have since returned home, his family has stayed in Tenerife.
Ex-police office Paul Williams-Thomas has also been conducting his own enquiries.
Lucy had launched a GoFundMe campaign, raising more than £52,000, after he disappeared.
Some of that has been used to fly out friends and family, and fund volunteers, the family has claimed.
Lucy has now posted an update from Jay’s mother, Debbie Duncan, claiming the money will be used to fly in a Dutch team of search and rescue experts previously deployed to natural disaster zones.
Debbie said: ‘Jay’s family would like to thank you all for your continued support at this difficult time.
‘Almost four weeks on and we are still no further in finding our beautiful boy. He was only four days into his holiday and his disappearance still remains a mystery.
‘We are still here in Tenerife searching daily with the help of volunteers and local hiking groups.
‘Paul is also still working tirelessly, which we are so grateful for and send him so much love and respect.
‘As you all know the Guardia Civil gave up the land search after 12 days.
‘We have been actively working with search and rescue teams and we can now confirm that we have a team of experts flying in over the weekend from the Netherlands, who will carry on the search with their specialist dogs.
‘We are only able to fund this with the generosity of all those who donated.
‘The team are the Signi Zoekhondon and this has taken lots of planning to get them over so thank you so much for your kindness.
‘Jay is just a normal hardworking young lad from Lancashire who is very loved by all who know him.
‘He is about to finish his three-year apprenticeship this month. Although we don’t have any answers to his disappearance we obviously have to remain positive.
‘Please continue to pray for him and our family. There is a lot of negativity unfortunately and this is adding to the heartbreak of the unknown.
‘So I would please just say send the love and positive thoughts to Jay, our beautiful son.’
The Signi Zoekhondon have used search dogs to look for survivors and dead bodies hidden in rubble left by earthquakes in Morocco and Turkey last year.
A man and a woman were found alive after 12 days buried beneath a collapsed apartment building in Turkey.
Speaking as they prepared to board a flight from Brussels Airport today, volunteer Marieke Krans told the BBC: ‘We are very committed to come and we are confident in the dogs and in ourselves.
‘Our dogs are trained to find people, both alive or dead, and have more skills. They can search underwater, and up mountains, whatever it may be.
‘They are really creative and that means there is more we can do. We will go where the dogs lead us.’
Signi Zoekhonden, a non-profit, will also use drones, if granted permission by local authorities, during what they expect to be a five-and-a-half day search.
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