Roger Jones: 16-yr-old boy vanished 45 years ago on same stretch of river Nicola Bulley disappeared
LANCASHIRE, ENGLAND: A Lancashire man has shared he lost his 16-year-old brother 45 years ago on the same stretch of river where missing mother Nicola Bulley disappeared. The mother of two was reportedly last seen on the morning of January 27 as she walked with her dog Willow near River Wyre. Lancashire Police and underwater search specialists have been searching the river but even after almost three weeks, the mother has still not been found.
Don Jones, from Preston, in Lancashire, said he knows the pain of Bulley’s family as he endured the same suffering when his brother Roger disappeared for more than two months. The 16-year-old, who was about to set off on his dream of being a farmer, had been riding passenger on a motorbike when it crashed into a car and he fell into the icy Lancashire waterway on January 27, 1978 - exactly 45 years before Nicola disappeared.
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'Must be a nightmare'
Don described how rescuers and police spent hours trying to find his brother, but in the end, his body was washed up on a sandbank at low tide. Roger was eventually found seven miles away from St Michael's on Wyre - the town Nicola was last seen. “He was obviously swept over the weir and into the tidal part of the river,” Don told the Daily Star. “It was just a case of waiting for what seemed inevitable.” The brother said a huge investigation operation was launched with dozens of dog squads, specialist divers, and police staff scattered around the waterway.
The brother continued by saying the river conditions when Roger vanished were "pretty similar" to when the mom-of-two went missing. As per Don, his family was left completely "exhausted" by the time Roger’s body was found. “We feel so much for Nicola's family and friends. We know just what they must be going through,” he added. Jones expressed empathy for the Bulley family's experience dealing with the public and conspiracy theories, saying that it "must be a nightmare" for them. He also noted that he had dealt with the intrusion of purported spiritualists and clairvoyants at the time. “[It] proved very upsetting, especially for our mum,” he said.
‘Any news on mommy?’
This came after Bulley’s friends and known ones organized a vigil for her and made an emotional appeal for any leads into her disappearance. “We just need Nikki home for her two beautiful little girls [aged six and nine] who need their mummy. It's like torture. The girls, when they get home from school, ask ‘any news on mummy?’ and Paul [Nikki's partner] has to say ‘no’ and he can see the little girls just deflate,” Emma White told DailyMail. “The little girl is saying ‘Is my mummy famous?’ I didn't quite know how to answer that myself… for the wrong reasons. Bring Nikki home, come to the sofa, with the girls, with Willow and you can have that happy story because that's what we're keeping hope for.”