THAT Billboard

The timing of the billboard, the hiring of the Scenic, the arrival of Sahlke & Taylor. All within 48 hours.

We know the evidence from the Scenic.
Sahlke and Taylor perform the grand gesture of giving up their jobs and the place they rent, sell their possessions to raise £5,000 - all towards the cause of finding Madeleine. Their £5,000 seems only to last for a few days and they disappear back to the UK. In Sahlke's case Nelson (not a million miles away from Skipton - home of Michael Wright.)

The huge inflatable billboard was not only going on a tour round the Algarve but parts of Europe according to press reports at the time (Telegraph and BBC). According to Gavin Hollywood (MD of PosterPlus who organised it) the jaunt lasted 13 days. Do we know where it went? I would find it interesting if the cadaver dogs were allowed to wander all over this presumably now deflated equipment.

Successful conspiracy relies on strong communication but with as little evidence as possible. Burying a body would leave one at risk of discovery. Not if one erected a huge inflatable billboard at the side of the road and dug behind it. If discovered - 'I'm digging a hole - going to concrete something in to secure this thing down. Bye!" Once hole is dug with billboard in situ I now have a large indicator to my fellow conspirators as to where said hole now is. No phone call required. No map. Just drive in the general direction of a town and you can't miss it. All they need to do is transport what is requiring to be buried - drop it in and refill the hole. Much quicker and with less chance of discovery.

And no one necessarily has to know what the preparation is about. Someone could suggest to the billboard tour - leave it in this spot for a couple of days - lots of passing traffic. To Sahlke and Taylor - we put the billboard by where we think there could be a spot, you know. Kate had this dream. Just put her mind at rest, would you? Hole is dug. Scenic pulls up day after and there you go. Billboard moves on. No one is the wiser.

The billboard with no publicity (other than its arrival), the ex-military from very close to Skipton (almost neighbours to Michael Wright also ex military) who sell everything for just a couple of days in the Algarve, the mysterious death of one of these men? Really? Too much of a coincidence. And Wright says Gerry wanted him named as a driver for the Scenic when he and his wife arrived to look after the twins in June 07. Why does Wright refuse? Seems harmless enough. Unless he did not want to be implicated in the driving of the Scenic at that time... The McCanns jetted off to Morocco a couple of days later wearing particularly mournful outfits... 

I say find where the billboard was stood and you'll probably find something else... Just a theory....

Good to raise this in new thread. I mentioned these two paratroopers combing the area of PdL in the `Digging` thread - surely they would have found newly dug ground - or perhaps they were saying they had searched in places where they had not - saying `no need to search there because we`ve checked already`.

You`ve raised an interesting theory about what the billboard could have been used for - and the timing of its arrival is interesting as well - as is Sahlke`s suspicious death, as if he might have been unstable and a risk.

Its almost a hiding in plain sight scenario.

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Woofer wrote:Good to raise this in new thread. I mentioned these two paratroopers combing the area of PdL in the `Digging` thread - surely they would have found newly dug ground - or perhaps they were saying they had searched in places where they had not - saying `no need to search there because we`ve checked already`.

You`ve raised an interesting theory about what the billboard could have been used for - and the timing of its arrival is interesting as well - as is Sahlke`s suspicious death, as if he might have been unstable and a risk.

Its almost a hiding in plain sight scenario.

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You can see by the photo that it drew crowds. Surreal image. A bloody great piece of kit like that steams into town and the past master of self-publicity hasn't mustered a scrap of interest in the locality. It's a bit like Have I Got News For You, think of a caption.

GM (to a passing fruit seller): We were just on our way to the beach when we saw this. Kate and I are as surprised as anybody.

The billboard as a means of transport has been thoroughly deflated one might say.
The stunt was  set up by Uncle John. It didn't come free although somebody else paid for it. It's well known by charities and fund raisers that the competitive Brits will always give more and do more  by using similar stunts.
So making a big thing of the billboard and the two guys driving it around for free helped to bring in the £££££s.
The operators  were paid as per usual. In total some £ 20.000,00. Iirc.

The two SAS were photographed exploring rather large drains and one of them eventually died of a drug overdose I think.  The event brought a lot of  such people out of the woodwork.

If you look at some of the companies and charities  associated with the McCanns and their supporters, most of them, in some way relate to "Outdoor Media".  Could this huge, globe trotting billboard have been the start of a big advertising campaign for all of them?

sharonl wrote:If you look at some of the companies and charities  associated with the McCanns and their supporters, most of them, in some way relate to "Outdoor Media".  Could this huge, globe trotting billboard have been the start of a big advertising campaign for all of them?

Well, Missing People finally got round to it last year with an apparent freeby launched by their ambassador Ms Healy.

But perhaps the company which provided the free advertising has links with such charities/companies?

Here's some work you did earlier Sharonl!  

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