POLICE searching for a missing RAF gunner who vanished while on a night-out with friends are examining a phone found close to where the airman’s mobile was last detected.
Corrie McKeague, 23, from Fife, was last seen in the early hours of September 24 in Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk.
A mobile phone found by a member of the public in the Mildenhall area – some 14 miles from where Mr McKeague was last seen – is now being examined by police to see if it is linked to the case.
On Monday, it was revealed that April Oliver, 21, the girlfriend of Mr McKeague, was expecting a child.
Miss Oliver told BBC Look East she discovered she was pregnant in October – just weeks after Mr McKeague’s disappearance.
She said: “I’ve had to make a massive decision by myself. I was hoping and praying that he’d come back so we could make the decision together.”
The baby is due in late spring/early summer and she told the programme that Mr McKeague did not know about the pregnancy.
The pair had been together for about five months after meeting on a dating site.
Mr McKeague’s mother, Nicola Urquhart, who is a police officer from Dunfermline, told the BBC: “It’s incredibly difficult to bounce my head from the excitement of a new baby to what we’re actually trying to focus on, which is finding Corrie.”
Mr McKeague, a gunner and team medic, based at RAF Honington, was separated from friends while leaving the Flex nightclub on St Andrews Street South.
He was last seen in Bury St Edmunds town centre on CCTV at 3.25am wearing a light pink Ralph Lauren shirt, white jeans and brown suede Timberland boots with light soles.
The last sighting shows him walking from a shop doorway and into a horseshoe-shaped area in Brentgovel Street, with no sign of him emerging.
A spokeswoman for Suffolk Constabulary said: “Police are continuing searches to try to locate Corrie McKeague.
“As part of this, a small team of officers have been carrying out work in the vicinity Corrie was last seen, in the St John Street area.
“This involves visiting premises, speaking to staff and employees and searching buildings.
“Many of these people will have already been contacted previously as part of the ongoing investigation.
“The decision to carry out the work this week is not based on specific information that Corrie entered any of these buildings, however without finding Corrie leaving the horseshoe area it becomes even more important to ensure that all possibilities are explored.”
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