It has been a week since mum-of-two Nicola Bulley went missing while out walking her dog. The 45-year-old's tearful family has been pleading for anyone with information to get in touch as they describe their 'nightmare'.
Nicola's parents Ernest and Dot appeared on TV with Nicola's sister, Louise Cunningham. The family said they're "stuck in a nightmare" after the mum-of-two "vanished into thin air".
The 45-year-old mortgage adviser was last seen during a dog walk on Friday (January 27) in the Lancashire village of St Michaels on Wyre. Nicola - known as Nikki - has been missing for a week.
Here is what we know so far:
Nikki was walking her dog Willow
After leaving her daughters, aged six and nine, to school, the mum went to walk dog Willow on a towpath overlooking the River Wyre.
On Thursday emergency services carried out underwater searches in the river next to the bench where her phone was found.
The mortgage advisor has been on a work conference call and her phone was still logged in when it was discovered. Her microphone and camera had been turned off for the call.
Willow was found near the bench. The dog was dry so don't think she had been in the water.
The timeline
8.43am - Bulley walked along a path by the River Wyre after dropping her children off at school.
Around 8:50am - Someone who knows Bulley stopped with their dog to say hello as Nicola was walking around the lower field with her dog.
8.53am - Nicola sent an email to her boss.
9.01am - She logged into a Teams call.
Around 9.10am - Another witness spots Nicola with her dog.
9.30am – The Teams call ended but she remained online.
Around 9.35am - Nicola's mobile phone and dog were found by another dog walker by the river.
Significant text to friend
A friend has revealed Nikki texted a friend about meeting up the following week with her kids.
The friend told the Daily Express: “She booked a playdate, 8.57, she sent a text message to a friend whose mortgage she had just recently signed off on to arrange for the girls to go for tea this week.”
The friend said the message indicates that Nicola had no intention of going missing.
She said: “You wouldn’t have done that if you were going to get up and go missing."
What police have said
Lancashire Constabulary have confirmed they don't believe a third party is involved in the case. However another witness spotted on CCTV images has been identified by police.
Police have since traced a witness they wanted to speak with, who was wearing a red and white coat with a fur hood, light-coloured trousers and a light bobble hat. She was walking a small white dog.
The force said they wanted to speak to the woman as a witness and nothing more, and say there is nothing to suggest any third-party involvement in Nicola's disappearance.
What the family are saying
Nicola's sister Louise Cunningham, speaking to Sky News, said: "I just can't...if I'm being honest, it feels like I'm just stuck in a nightmare.
"We're going round and round in circles trying to piece together what could have possibly happened and we've just got to keep such an open mind with everything because we just have no idea where she is.
"It's like she's just vanished into thin air. There's no evidence to point us in any direction.
"Obviously, my hope is that she's still out there. Something's happened and she's... I don't know, needed to take herself off for whatever reason." She added: "We just want her home. We need her home, her children need her home. It's just absolutely heartbreaking."
Her father Ernie said: "This has just emptied our lives at the minute, we just feel so empty. We appreciate everything everyone is doing to find her. The police have been brilliant, the local community has been outstanding. But at the end of the day we just want her back."
He added: "We need the public to search their minds for anything they might have seen. The main thing is we want to find Nicola and get her back home.
"There are two young children there waiting for their mummy to come back. And if Nicola is out there and she's watching this - come home, contact the police. We just want you back."
Asked how much he missed his daughter, Ernie began to cry as he said: "Don't, it's hard... we're such a close knit family.
"We're a close knit family, we'd do anything for any one of us and the children would do the same for us. We're getting on in life, and the grandchildren, and our own children, are more and more important to us as we're getting older. So, yeah, I just hope she comes home."
He said that his family hoped their interview would "spark a light" that would lead to finding Nicola. "We're holding onto this, not our last hope, but this is going to reach out to millions of people, and we're just hoping that from doing this interview that something may come of it which will spark a light and it will lead to us finding our daughter," he said.
What could have happened
David Wilson, emeritus professor of criminology at Birmingham City University, said officers are likely to be considering a number of options.
Professor Wilson told Express.co.uk someone goes missing in the UK every 90 seconds in any given year and of the 180,000 people who go missing, the vast majority are found within 24 to 48 hours.
He added: "It is usually one of five things: there's been an accident of some kind; or a suicide; or a person voluntarily goes missing, they want to get away for a completely fresh start, a different life; they have been abducted or they have been murdered."
Lancashire Police has said their detectives do not believe any crime has been committed and are treating the incident as a missing person inquiry.
How people can help
Family, friends and volunteers are planning to go out with banners at the exact time Nicola disappeared in the hope that it will jog someone's memory.
Nicola is white, 5ft 3in, with light brown shoulder-length hair. She speaks with an Essex accent. She was last seen wearing a long black gilet jacket with a hood, black jeans and olive-green ankle wellies. Her hair was tied into a ponytail.
Anybody who has seen Nicola, or has information about where she might be, is asked to call 101, quoting log 565 of January 30. For immediate sightings please call 999.
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