Jay Slater’s family return to mountains for own search with rescuers and dogs | World | News

Jay Slater‘s family have headed back to the mountains where the Lancashire native was last seen to launch their personal search for the missing teen.

Spain‘s Guardia Civil told the family they could head back to the area on Friday.

Jay’s father and brother started retracing his final steps alongside eight searchers and a dog nearly 20 days after his mysterious disappearance.

The new bid to locate Jay was launched a week after the Spanish Guardia Civil unexpectedly announced they would call off the search.

His family said they were “blindsided” by the decision and confirmed they would be staying in Tenerife to find out what happened to the 19-year-old.

Jay went missing in the morning of June 17 after a series of desperate calls to his friend Lucy Law warning he was lost on an off-road track and his phone was running out of battery.

The teen’s mum, Debbie, confirmed the family would be using the over £50,000 raised via GoFundMe to bring in a team of sleuths to help out with the search.

Dad Warren and brother Zak have been trekking along the mountains where Jay was last seen after lamenting they had been “left in the dark” by police.

The family has faced growing pressure since Jay’s disappearance, with mum Deb hitting back at trolls accusing them of misusing the funds.

She said: “For those of you who are more concerned about the GoFundMe page I can assure you that up to now it has not been used and our stay up to now has been financed by ourselves.

“I did not ask for publicity from the start and was not aware that the first missing poster had my telephone number on it.

“It should have had the SOS Guardia Civil but like I said this was out of my control. We are a normal working family from Lancashire going through hell.”

Jay shared his location with two friends minutes before his phone shut down on June 17. His last position was marked as somewhere off-road inside Teno Rural Park.

He is believed to have been walking back to his accommodation in Los Cristianos after leaving the NRG festival in the early hours of Monday with two British nationals.