Jay Slater: Mother of teenager missing in Tenerife in ‘living nightmare’ as search continues

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

The mother of missing teenager Jay Slater said searching for her son was “an absolute living nightmare”, while his friend criticised the efforts of Spanish police.

Jay Slater, 19, has been missing since Monday morning after attending the NRG music festival while on holiday in Tenerife. He was last heard from at around 8.15am when he called his friend to tell her that he had missed his bus, was lost and only had one per cent phone battery.

He had ended up on the other side of the tourist island after leaving the event with two new friends to travel to an isolated apartment. In the morning, he told his friend that he planned to walk back their accommodation, a journey expected to take around 11 hours on foot.

As the search continued into its third day, his friend Lucy Law told The Independent: “The police are not doing everything they can.

“It’s been longer than 72 hours now and there isn’t enough going on. They are still asking the same questions that should have been logged at 10am on Monday when I first reported this.”

Mr Slater’s mother, Debbie Duncan, flew to Tenerife in Spain’s Canary Islands on Tuesday morning to search for her son, who is an apprentice bricklayer.

Ms Duncan told ITV News: “It’s just a nightmare, it’s an absolute living nightmare. I wouldn’t wish this on anybody. I just want my baby back.

“Please just anybody who can help – look for him. It’s a massive area up there. He’s out there somewhere or somebody knows where he is.”

Reflecting on how this trip had been Mr Slater’s first holiday abroad without his parents, she said: “I wish I hadn’t encouraged him to go to this. I should have said: ‘Don’t go to Tenerife.’

“I just think he was probably still in high spirits, buzzing – he’s not known where he is. He’s not known the extent of the long journey that he went on to get up there.

“And he’s just thought: ‘I’m gonna walk.’ And that’s what apparently he said to the last person he contacted.”

Describing her son, Ms Duncan said: “He’s the life and soul, he’s a beautiful boy.”

Mr Slater’s friend Lucy – who went to the island with him to attend the festival – spoke to the missing teenager on Monday morning, with him informing her that he was lost and dehydrated. While he managed to send her a picture of his location, his phone died at around 8.50am which gave his last known whereabouts in the Rural de Teno national park.

A mountainous area popular with hikers, it has been described as “quite deserty” with little access to fresh water.

As the search enters its fourth day, a local journalist said Thursday marked a “key day” in rescue proceedings, with mountain specialists, drones, helicopters and sniffer dogs all deployed.

Ms Law said that one of the people Mr Slater had met had driven them back to his apartment in a hire car and the missing man had not realised how far away it was.

“He’s ended up out in the middle of nowhere. Jay was obviously thinking he would be able to get home from there,” she said.

“But then in the morning he’s set off walking, using his maps on his phone and ended up in the middle of mountains with nothing around.”

Mr Slater was last seen wearing a white T-shirt with shorts and trainers.

A Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office spokesperson said: “We are supporting the family of a British man who has been reported missing in Spain and are in contact with the local authorities.”