'I flew out to Tenerife when Jay Slater disappeared - it was a very different island'

When Jay Slater disappeared, millions were captivated, and everyone sought answers. Photographers, journalists, and TV news broadcasting vans were immeadiate presences at the scene. Senior reporter for Manchester Evening News James Holt was among the first journalists dispatched to Tenerife in the wake of Jay Slater's disappearance.

"Quickly joining the national media storm, I was among an army of reporters staying on the small tourist island which had fast become the focus of global attention," he shared. The bustling centres of Los Cristianos and Playa de las Americas carried on as normal, but the tranquil northern towns and villages closer to where Jay disappeared, some 20 miles from the lively resort, became the hotbed of the chaotic media storm.

The handful of locals, used to their serene, rural existence, found their lives disrupted by the influx of summer tourists, emergency services, search teams, door-knocking journalists and well-meaning individuals who had all jetted out in a bid to lend a hand.

Within 24 hours of the first reporting Jay's disappearance, the surge in online interest sparked a whirlwind of conspiracy theories and catapulted the teenager's disappearance onto the international stage.

Social media groups saw their membership numbers skyrocket by the hour. Thousands of members were initially eager to do whatever they could to assist.

The uproar surrounding the case quickly transformed social media users into a legion of self-styled online detectives, convinced they could unearth answers quicker than the authorities.

It seemed as though the online crowd had overlooked the fact that there was a distressed family at the heart of it all. Throughout the search for the 19-year-old, questions lingered, which videos and homemade YouTube documentaries attempted to answer.

Why had he journeyed to the rural mountainous village so far from where he'd been partying the night before? Who was he with? Why did he stay in an Airbnb rental so far away? And why did he try to walk back alone early the next morning?

But most crucially - what had happened to him? James continued: "As a journalist, I was tasked with answering those questions where possible and providing a platform for trusted news amid the overwhelming social media noise.

"But I too was often met with a wall of silence from all angles. I spoke to Jay's family, directly with search teams and also those living on the island to provide a stream of updates - but the police in Tenerife rarely cooperated with us.

"I was also hounded with questions on Jay's disappearance on social media. It was easy for those sitting thousands of miles away to find holes in the case and cluster up a list of conspiracy - and unproven - theories."

James went on to say: "But it was actually being there and experiencing the desolate and dangerous landscape for myself that highlighted the danger that young Jay could've easily found himself in. It seemed likely that the most obvious of answers - him suffering a tragic fall on unfamiliar land - could've been true all along."

Now, at his inquest, the crucial question regarding his cause of death and the location where the body of the Lancashire teenager was discovered has been answered. Yet, the proceedings have cast further doubts over the case through allegations of drug use, the theft of a £12,000 Rolex, missing witnesses and the inability to locate some of the last individuals to see the teenager alive.

Jay had been residing and partying in the Playa de las Americas resort. On his first independent holiday without his family, the 19-year-old had jetted off to the Canary Islands with his mates for the annual NRG festival.

The investigation commenced when Jay's phone last signalled, before running out of battery atop a steep mountain a few miles north of the Masca village. James shared: "A world away from the bustling tourism hotspot of the resort, I witnessed how there was comparatively very little tourism in the small rural town.

"I arrived in Tenerife and the following day, drove up to Masca from Costa Adeje, close by to where Jay had been staying in a hotel with friends. What initially struck me was how long, tiresome and often treacherous the journey was.

"Among the other reporters trying to get to the bottom of what had happened, I questioned why a young man planning on partying the holiday away on the main strip and its many bars and clubs would've found himself in an area so inconvenient and far away."

Once you veered off the main motorway, there was only one way into and out of the Masca village area. From Santiago del Teide village, an incredibly steep, winding and narrow road stretched for about 7km, taking nearly half an hour to navigate.

On both sides of the road were towering cliffs and deep gorges. The entire landscape of the Parque Rural de Teno nature reserve, where Jay tragically lost his life, while stunningly beautiful, was extremely perilous.

"My daily drive up to the search site was nail-bitingly tense and left me feeling uneasy. The landscape was that of steep ravines that have been formed over thousands of years.

"They are scattered across Tenerife but especially congregate around the Masca area. It was clear to see how someone could get lost up there, become disoriented or confused in the heat, or take a wrong turn and lose their footing," James stated.

The area is a magnet for thrill-seeking tourists due to its various hiking trails, some of which are barely visible, that wind along the barrancos - but for those unfamiliar with the surroundings, it could be a potential death trap. The area was fraught with hairpin bends and narrow trails, with sheer cliff edges running alongside them.

Apart from a few footpaths, regular tourists rarely strayed from the main road. James continued: "As a journalist covering Jay's disappearance, it was clear that the emergency search and rescue teams had a mammoth job on their hands.

"Not just due to the menacing terrain, but the intense, dry heat up in the mountains and the ability to mobilise specialist resources in an area so sparse. Miles of wilderness, desolate greenery, mountains and ravines dominated the landscape.

"If the theory was correct in that Jay had somehow fallen to his tragic death, finding him would've been an almost impossible task - betting almost purely on chance in ever stumbling across his remains. Almost daily, helicopters circled the area overhead. The aircraft were lowering specialist mountain rescue teams into the overgrowth below."

Bomberos (fire service) teams and police search dogs navigated through the ground and up rocky footpaths. Throughout the searches, James saw teams standing on viewpoints and looking over footpath stages, pointing out potential areas to scour through.

Using Google Translate, he even spoke to members of the fire service and Guardia Civil who initially told me they 'still had hope' of finding the teenager. But Civil Defence officers at the search base told the Manchester Evening News that the vast area, split up into three different ravines, was around 30km wide.

They essentially had a huge map with no real starting point and no direction. A member of the Civil Defence search team said: "We still have hope that he's alive, up until the last moment when the last hope is lost."

They expressed their exasperation over the elusive search: "The truth is that we feel a bit frustrated because we can't find him. It's so big [here] that it's very difficult to search in such a steep area. But we're doing everything we can."

Meanwhile, online sleuths mulled over theories of suspect third-party play in Jay's mysterious case, initially rejecting the notion that he could've simply fallen from a cliff. From James' standpoint, however, that theory was always a credible likelihood.

Near the spot where Jay disappeared stood scant few structures, including a cafe and a well-visited lookout. Given these circumstances, it was entirely feasible that the teen was sighted by only a handful before his odyssey into the expansive and unforgiving terrain.

Poised next to a winding road, bordered by dramatic cliffs, the quaint Airbnb he allegedly shared with two other individuals, who were not his travelling companions, was notably isolated.

James continued: "After visiting the small secluded villa, it equally posed the question of why anyone, who had their sights on partying and attending a busy festival on the southern resorts of the island, would even stay there.

" The drive was easily 40 minutes, depending on the confidence of whoever was driving along the narrow steep track, and a taxi would have cost upwards of 80 euros."

The inquest on Wednesday (May 21) heard that Ayub Qassim, a convicted drug dealer in his 30s, was one of the two men who invited Jay back to the remote Airbnb in Masca after the NRG rave. He is believed to be one of the last people to see him alive.

Ayub was questioned by Spanish police about Jay's disappearance, but he was deemed 'irrelevant' to the case and allowed to return to the UK. The inquest then heard that the Metropolitan Police had attempted to locate Ayub before the hearing, but officers were unable to find him for further questioning.

On the morning of his disappearance, Jay reportedly asked several people for bus times and directions, intending to walk back to his hotel. James said: "Having visited the area, bus services are extremely infrequent. He had no water and a phone that was running out of battery.

"Had I not have had my hire car to travel around the island, I wouldn't have fancied my chances of getting back quickly either The journey back to the popular resort of Playa de las Americas is not one you could make on foot in June's dry heat with no water or food. It would take between 10 and 12 hours to complete and involves steep inclines and cliff pathways."

On 15 July, precisely four weeks after the teenager vanished, Spanish authorities announced that human remains had been discovered in the Masca region, near where the 19-year-old disappeared. Throughout the probe, his lifeless body had been nearby all along, in the 300-foot-deep Juan Lopez ravine.

The inquest heard he met his tragic demise after sustaining severe injuries consistent with a 'heavy fall from height'. The court was informed that the 19-year-old's death would have been 'instantaneous or extremely quick'.

A toxicology report revealed ecstasy in Jay's system, while a cocaine metabolite was also detected, indicating both cocaine and alcohol consumption. Despite extensive searches spanning miles, he was also incredibly close to Masca and the area where he was last confirmed to be when his phone battery died.

Finally, this began to quash some of the rumours and headlines that have prevailed for 10 months.