Nicola Bulley: 'nothing to suggest' tatty red van is suspicious, as Lancashire Police investigate vehicle spotted on the day she disappeared

Police have confirmed that they received reports about the van, and are ‘making efforts to identify the owner’ – but said there is nothing to suggest it’s anything other than one of many hundreds of vehicles in the area that morning.

A 55-year-old unnamed witness told The Times that they saw a “tatty red van in Hall Lane outside a barn” on the day of Nicola’s disappearance.

They said: “I didn’t think anything at the time, but when I saw Nicola had gone missing, I called 101 and spoke to an operator.”

The witness said the van could have been a Renault, adding it was the ‘sort of van you can live in’.

Another witness told The Sun that they had reported seeing a red van which “looked suspicious” at around 9.40am. They called the police three days after the mum-of-two went missing and was asked if they had any dashcam footage of the vehicle.

Lancashire Police say they are continuing to investigate all possible leads, and this involves viewing CCTV, Dashcam footage and speaking to people who are providing information.

A spokesperson said: “We are aware of reports in the media about a red van being reported to us and we would like to stress that while this has been reported to us and we are making efforts to identify the owner at this time there is nothing to suggest this was anything other than one of many hundreds of vehicles in the area that morning. The inquiry team are working through hundreds of pieces of information and reports such as this in the media can distract them from genuine enquiries.”

As the search reaches the two-week mark, police have moved the focus of the search further downstream into the area of the river which becomes tidal and then out towards the coast.

Lancashire Police added: [We are] keeping an open mind about what might have happened to Nicola, and we continue to look at all the potential scenarios to eliminate them. We are reviewing our decisions regularly.”