Madeleine McCann search LIVE: Cops hone in on abandoned buildings & drop wider search as radar scanner and JCB deployed
DIG FOR TRUTH Madeleine McCann search LIVE: Cops hone in on abandoned buildings & drop wider search as radar scanner and JCB deployed
POLICE hunting for Madeleine McCann have scrapped plans to scour wider areas and are now zeroing in on a cluster of derelict buildings in Portugal.
Officers confirmed the new focus comes after key developments in their 'now or never' search — with hopes that vital evidence could be hidden in the abandoned structures.
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Radar equipment is being used in the search
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Search teams use a JCB backhoe close to Praia De Luz in the hunt for Maddie
Credit: PA
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Madeleine McCann went missing while on holiday with her family in 2007
Credit: PA
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Christian Brueckner appears in court in Germany last month
Credit: Dan Charity
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It follows days of intensive digging in scrubland near Praia da Luz, where prime suspect Christian Brueckner was known to frequent.
Cops earlier deployed a radar scanner and JCB digger in the "now or never" search for the missing tot.
The advanced scanner will show what lies 15ft underground in Praia da Luz, Portugal, where Madeleine vanished from a holiday flat in 2007 aged three.
Pictures show a large yellow backhoe being used to excavate a site in the scrubland known as prime suspect Christian Brueckner's "rat run".
The Sun team on the ground saw the excavator pulling back earth as the number of cops on site has doubled on day two of the search.
Radar equipment was also seen in use for the first time today, with derelict barns cleared earlier in preparation for the scanning.
In one, visited by The Sun, piles of rubble had been thrown out of the building, leaving a clear floor ready for the ground radar.
At least five different abandoned buildings were being searched today.
The search today extended to two more derelict barns, in the same area of scrubland.
It comes after we revealed key figures in the case were flown back to Germany to give further at statements on the claims Brueckner kidnapped and killed the toddler in 2007.
At least two of these former Brueckner associates have since been relocated and given new mobile phones.
The ongoing searches are understood to be linked to the secret meetings, which took place at the start of the year.
On Tuesday, officers concentrated their efforts on a ramshackle property and a well, located in southern Portugal just a few miles from Praia da Luz.
Searchers were scouring the dilapidated farmhouse and draining a well within secluded shrubland just outside of the Portuguese town of Praia da Luz.
What appear to be boxes of soil and debris were being removed from the hillside on Tuesday as cops used chainsaws to cut through roots and undergrowth to access the soil.
Prolific thief Brueckner used the bushy area near his cottage back in 2007 as a rat run.
A police theory is the three-year-old or her pyjamas might have been dumped in trenches near the holiday resort that were dug as part of extensive works at the time.
Brueckner is set for release from jail in September after serving a seven-year prison sentence in Germany for a 2005 Praia da Luz rape.
He has never been formally charged over Madeleine's disappearance and denies any involvement.
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