Follow the latest updates as the search for Emiliano Sala, a pilot and a missing plane was called off on Thursday afternoon without any trace of the missing Cardiff City striker in the English Channel.
The search was called off after a fourth unsuccessful day since the aircraft disappeared off radars on Monday night north of Guernsey. After officials confirmed that the priority of the search changed from a rescue mission to a recovery operation, a statement from police said that Thursday search will focus on coastal areas of the Channel Islands and northern France, yet this turned up nothing linked to the missing aircraft.
Cardiff City have said that they are “realistic” about the fate of Sala, who joined the club in a £15m deal last weekend, and revelations about the aeroplane that was carrying Sala and pilot Dave Ibbotson continue to emerge, including a voice message left by Sala to his friends in Argentina in the final hours before he disappeared complaining about the condition of the plane and his fear for his safety. Follow the live updates below.
Please, please, please don’t stop the search. We understand the effort but please don’t stop the search. For us, they are still alive. It’s difficult to express our feelings at the moment because everything is really hard.The last time I spoke to him was on Monday before he said farewell to the Nantes players. He was really excited about coming to Cardiff and we were talking all day
My team have just me to review the search and rescue operation which has been underway since the plane disappeared on Monday night.
Despite the best efforts of air and search assets from the Channel Islands, UK and France, which has covered an area of approximately 1,700sq. miles – with a significant amount of this searched more than once – and having examined mobile phone data and satellite imagery, we have been unable to find any trace of the aircraft, the pilot or the passenger.
There has been over 24 hours of continuous searching, with 80 hours combined flying time across three planes and five helicopters. Two lifeboats have also been involved, as well as assistance from various passing ships and fishing boats.
We reviewed all the information available to us, as well as knowing what emergency equipment was on board, and have taken the difficult decision to end the search.
BREAKING
The area has been very well covered, there is absolutely no chance of finding anybody alive now, the only thing that we might be able to do would be to pinpoint where the aircraft went in, but I think the radar trace is going to be the best opportunity of doing that.
Air Search One, our search aircraft, is about to launch.
He will do a coastal search up around a Alderney, Burhou, down the French coast, including the north coast of Jersey today and back over Sark.
We’re not launching any lifeboats today, nor are we requesting any assets from the UK or France.
We consider that the hopes of finding someone alive have faded to almost zero now.
But we are not giving up. We are going to conduct this sweep of the coastline and we are targeting a life raft. We will review our continued search plan as soon as that is complete.
'The dressing room is pretty sombre'
I went to see the first-team yesterday. I have to ensure the manager is fine, the coaching team is fine, the office staff are fine and the players are fine.I spoke to the captain [Sean Morrison] and some of the leaders and they are trying to cope with the situation. The dressing room is pretty sombre, they are all shocked with the situation.As chief executive, I have to try and pull them together, to try to get over this and we have a game to play next week.Everyone knows it is difficult, the players are aware of all the facts but we still have to pull up our socks and get on with it.
I think from the club's perspective, we are managing the situation but we have another department that has to continue with looking at the transfers.I am basically multi-tasking three or four jobs at once. It is really difficult physically and emotionally and mentally to cope in a situation like this.We have to segregate our minds into looking for Emiliano, segregate our minds into helping the family - and the club is trying its best to provide the most care for the family and giving them the information they want, we want to tell them all the facts line-by-line.We are still running a business which continues, we still have to meet the transfer deadline.We have spoken to the Premier League on how tough it is for us to cope given there are eight days to go [until the deadline] and we have been watching Emiliano for months and we got it over the line finally.And now we have eight days to go and we don't really know how to cope with this scenario but we have to meet the deadline.The bottom line from the Premier League is that you have to meet the deadline like everyone else.
It is is really a puffin reserve, it is tiny but you can land on it. The plane and helicopters have been over many times since Monday night, but they haven’t seen anything in that area.
It is only a few hundred metres long and it has been saturated by helicopters and fixed wing aircraft. We are airborne at the moment searching in that area. The flares I have seen pictures of are most likely aircraft trails.
UPDATE
I can confirm that when Emiliano made myself and his agent Meissa N'Diaye aware that he wished to travel back to Nantes following his medical and signing on Friday, I began to look into arranging a private flight to take him to Nantes on Saturday morning.
I have been in contact with officials from Cardiff and the player's agent over these difficult past few days and will continue to do so.
He added: "As the Channel Islands air searcher said, the survival times for someone in the water is very low, we estimated that at around three hours, the time of survival in a life raft would be longer.
"No-one could be more concerned for these two men's safety than myself... You can be sure that my focus is still on trying to deal with any hope of survival."
Where are they searching today?
UPDATE
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