Nicola Bulley: Diving expert says case is one of the most 'baffling' he has ever worked on

A diving expert says the case of missing mum-of-two Nicola Bulley is one of the most "baffling" he has ever worked on.

Peter Faulding and his team at Specialist Group International spent Monday, 6 February searching for the missing woman, who vanished while walking her dog along the River Wyre on Friday 27 January.

A three-mile area was searched using high-tech sonar equipment and on Tuesday 7 February, the team began re-examining an area upstream, where Nicola is believed to have disappeared.

Speaking to Ben Shepherd and Susanna Reid on Good Morning Britain, Peter Faulding said:

"We are going to focus on an area upstream, close to where Nicola's phone was found.

"That area was searched by professional police divers when she was reported missing, but nothing was found, which is highly unusual because normally when we deal with drowning victims, they go to the bottom and stay there for a while."

Peter Faulding cast doubt on Lancashire Police's current working hypothesis that Ms Bulley had fallen into the river.

He said: "If we don't find her today, I don't believe she is here.

"I think a third party is involved."

When asked whether Nicola could simply be "in a different part of the river", Mr Faulding said: "Unless someone has put her in a different part of the river somewhere, or she's fallen in somewhere...but it's a very short stretch."

"We're all confused with this one, this is a totally unusual case, I've never seen anything like this one."

Lancashire Police believes the 45-year-old mortgage adviser went missing in just "a 10-minute window" on 27 January while she was walking her dog, Willow, close to the River Wyre, after dropping off her daughters - aged six and nine - at school.

Ms Bulley had logged in to a Microsoft Teams call at 9.01am, which ended at 9.30am with her phone still connected to the call.

She was seen by another dog walker at 9.10am - the last known sighting - and police traced telephony records of her mobile phone as it remained on a bench overlooking the river at 9.20am.

The device was found by a dog walker at around 9.35am, with Willow nearby.

Nicola's partner Paul Ansell released a statement on Monday, 6 February saying that the couple's children "miss their mummy desperately" and "need her back".

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