Dozens of police officers will gather this morning at an area of bushland where they believe the body of missing mother-of-three Samantha Murphy has been hidden, after revealing new details about secret searches for her over the past six weeks.
The 51-year-old woman was last seen leaving her home on Eureka Street in Ballarat, Victoria, to go for a run in the Canadian State Forest on the morning of February 4.
On Wednesday morning, Victoria Police Missing Persons Unit Detective Inspector Dave Dunstan told a media group that search teams were expected to enter treacherous bushland near Grenville, south of Ballarat, as soon as weather permitted.
The region has been bombarded with heavy rains but the situation is expected to improve before noon.
Search areas are believed to be taking place in hilly terrain west of Enfield Plantation, which has already been searched for the seven months since Ms Murphy went missing.
A large police force has gathered at Grenville Recreation Reserve, with officers seen preparing to leave with the help of horses, dogs and motorbikes.
Missing Persons Squad detectives joined specialist officers from New South Wales Police and their Australian federal counterparts on Tuesday in the latest large-scale search.
Inspector Dunstan said police had actually been searching the area on and off for the past month and a half.
“There are a number of areas that we’re really looking at in different areas,” he told reporters gathered at the meeting point.
Samantha Murphy’s body was never found, seven months after her disappearance
Police with sniffer dogs have gathered at Grenville Recreation Reserve and are expected to be in the area on Wednesday.
Inspector Dunstan said search teams faced dangerous conditions, which had only been made worse by bad weather.
“The danger is that there are also a lot of mines here and that is one of the reasons why we have launched the search and rescue team,” he said.
“There are a lot of unidentified mines… so it’s super dangerous.”
Police are believed to be searching several areas spanning a radius of up to three kilometres of rugged terrain.
Up to 45 officers are expected to join the search, and a select number of media representatives will be brought to the area sometime Wednesday.
It is not yet known how long police will remain in the area, but detectives are understood to remain hopeful that the latest search will result in the recovery of Ms Murphy’s body.
Detective Inspector Dave Dunstan of Victoria Police’s Missing Persons Unit is leading the search efforts.
Police gathered at Grenville Recreation Reserve on Wednesday
Police have launched multiple searches of the bush since February as part of their extensive investigation into Ms Murphy’s disappearance.
Detectives found her mobile phone near a dam in Buninyong, 10 minutes from her home in June.
The phone was intact and in perfect condition.
The new search in Grenville is less than 15 kilometres from Buninyonng.
Ms. Murphy’s body was never found.
She was last seen leaving her home on Eureka Street to go for a run in Canadian State Forest on the morning of February 4.
A month later, police charged shopkeeper Patrick Orren Stephenson, 22, with murdering Ms Murphy in Mount Clear on the day she disappeared.
Mrs Murphy’s husband Mick and their three children are desperate for answers.
Police have charged 22-year-old shopkeeper Patrick Orren Stephenson with Ms Murphy’s murder.
At his last court appearance last month, prosecutors asked the court to adjourn the court appearance for 12 weeks to allow them to review a summary of evidence containing “extensive” CCTV footage.
Stephenson remains in custody and is expected to reappear in court on November 14.
He is the son of Orren Stephenson, who played 15 AFL games for Geelong and Richmond between 2012 and 2014.