by Mick the Ram

The remains of a 19-year-old British tourist have been discovered on the Spanish holiday island of Tenerife.

Jay Slater was last heard from on Sunday 16 June when he called friends to say he was lost in a mountainous area and had only 1% battery-life left on his mobile phone.

The Lancashire teenager had reportedly missed a bus back to where he was staying after he had attended the final day of the NRG music festival at Papagayo night club in Playa de las Americas, on the other side of the island.

He had said he was going to walk back, a journey that would have taken him all day to complete, but he never showed up and the following day a huge search and rescue mission involving helicopters, drones and search dogs was launched.

Two weeks after going missing the Spanish police called off the land search for the apprentice bricklayer, which had been concentrated around the tiny village of Masca, a settlement surrounded on all sides by towering volcanic cliffs.

He was eventually found in what has been described as a very inaccessible part of the island, full of drops and thick vegetation and is thought to have fallen down a chasm of some description, explaining why it took 29 days to locate the body.

All seemed well after festival

In the early hours of the morning following his attendance at the festival, Mr Slater reportedly entered a car with two British men he had met during the course of the holiday.

He is believed to have ended up at an Airbnb rental in the small settlement of Masca, planted in a rural national park, about a 40 minutes drive north from where he was staying.

He posted a photograph on his Snapchat account showing him at the doorway of a property, tagged with the location: Parque Rural de Teno.

Disappeared without a trace

His friends, Brad Hargreaves and Lucy Law, said they spoke to him between 07:30am and 08:50am when he confirmed to them that his intention was to walk back, despite not being properly equipped for the heat, or the terrain.

The next day after he failed to show up or make contact, local police, the Civil Guard, firefighters and mountain rescue teams began searching and his mother and brother flew out to help.

There was simply no sign of the young man and the search was scaled down, but continued in a more discreet fashion.

News everyone feared

A “Go Fund Me” page was set up to raise money to intensify resources, but then on Monday 15 July – four weeks after last being seen – a body was located, close to where he had disappeared.

In the weeks since his disappearance social media had – as is often the case when people go missing – been full of conspiracy theories, which were obviously very distressing for the family.

Now he has been found those stories should end, although exactly why the teen ended up in such a remote and clearly dangerous tract and why and how he came to sustain his fatal injuries, may never be known.

Body identified

A court statement confirmed that documentation found on the body belonged to Jay Slater. It went on to say that “everything suggests that it was an accidental fall” but the results of the official investigation into the death would take more time.

“We have a positive identification and more data: fingerprint tests show that the body is that of Jay Slater and that the death was caused by trauma consistent with a fall in a rocky area.”

Parents worst nightmare

His mother, Debbie Duncan released her own statement in which she said the confirmation of her son’s death was the “worst news”. She went on to say: “I just can’t believe this could happen to my beautiful boy. Our hearts are broken”.

Lucy Law, who was the last known person to speak to Mr Slater during a phone call on 17 June, said in a post on her Instagram page: “Honestly lost for words. Always the happiest and most smiley person in the room, you was (sic) one of a kind Jay and you’ll be missed more than you know.”

Appears to be a tragic accident

The small village of Masca only has half a dozen properties and the steepness of the road there has been likened before to “driving in the sky”.

A local said it was “exceptionally difficult” to navigate safely down to the foot of the valley and would normally require the correct footwear. Another suggested that the spot where he was found seemed to indicate that he had wandered a long way into the ravine, adding that it was “hard to understand how he got there”.

The place is far-removed from the party-scene normally associated with Tenerife, and usually only attracts hardcore hikers and nature lovers, who would definitely be dressed more appropriately for the surroundings than the attire Jay Slater was wearing on that tragic day.