Madeleine's last movements tracked by the GNR sniffer dogs.

[Mr Moderator]

Okay, I stand corrected. Though after lunch Maddie first went into the play area near the Tapas, and then to drop of the twins. It doesn't make a big difference anyway. And I think the most probable explanation is that the dogs took the route because the scent there was the freshest, left by Maddie (or Amelie if it was her blanket) after the high tea.

The question is why there was no trail left by Maddie carried by the abductor. He didn't carry her to the Tapas, right?

When someone is carried they leave an airborne scent which is easily dissipated and especially so if it is windy.  It is not surprising therefore that the GNR dogs failed to follow her on the night she disappeared.

The failure of the sniffer dogs to track her last movement is also indicative that she never walked out of that apartment barefoot and most definitely did not use the rear patio door exit.

[pegasus]

When someone is carried they leave an airborne scent which is easily dissipated and especially so if it is windy...

On the other hand, wind might increase the rate at which skin cells are shed and deposited onto the surrounding environment? A human sheds hundreds of skin particles per second.

[pegasus]

... The failure of the sniffer dogs to track her last movement is also indicative that she never walked out of that apartment barefoot ...

Dogs regularly track people who are wearing shoes.

I found a research experiment where the target people were dressed in full-body protective suits designed to allow no scent through, and the dogs were given the task of tracking them - and surprisingly yes the dogs succeeded.

[pegasus]

Tracker dogs can determine the direction of a scent trail

There are three phases, which complete the process of tracking:

1. Searching Phase

        This is the phase in which dogs attempt to find a track. They move quickly, and take short, quick sniffs.

2. Deciding Phase

        Once the dog has found the track, they move more slowly and take longer sniffs to determine the direction of the track. This is usually the most difficult phase for the dog.

3. Tracking phase

        After determining the direction, dogs follow the track by sniffing at a uniform pace, and moving at a speed similar to that of the searching.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracking_%28dog%29

[pegasus]

A research study indicating that tracker dogs are very good at working out the direction of a scent trail

Abstract: Dogs have the ability to determine the direction of an odour trail left by a human. This study examined how much olfactory information from this trail is required by dogs to determine direction. Six dogs, able to determine direction, were tested on a 21 footstep trail laid on 21 individual carpet squares, one footstep per square, by the same individual wearing the same shoes. Dogs brought in at right-angles to the trail at its centre were able to correctly determine direction better than chance (P < 0.025). Dogs were unable to determine direction when the order of the footsteps was randomized by rearranging the order of the carpet squares. When the individual odour cue was removed, but ground disturbance left, dogs were unable to determine direction, indicating that it was the odour of the individual that was used to determine direction. In the final experiment the number of footsteps made available to the dog was reduced from 21 to 11 and then 9, 7, 5 and finally 3. Dogs were able to determine direction from 5 footsteps but not 3. It was calculated that it takes ∼1–2 s for the odour information in footsteps to change to provide discernible information that can be used by dogs to determine direction. The process by which dogs may determine direction from odour cues is discussed.

http://chemse.oxfordjournals.org/content/30/4/291.full

[VIXTE]

So, you think it was not Madeleine whose scent was followed to the car park?

And why: because you think someone else touched Madeleine's towel or whatever it was given to the dogs?

Can we conclude this with 100% accuracy? 50%? How many percent this would be truly accurate?

I mean if we are taking hear says as true statements, then we conclude the dogs followed someone else's trail to the car park? Whose trail was this? Has Mr Amaral found it out? It was one of his most significant clues!

So, if not Madeleine's whose trail was this? Matthew Odlfield's? Didn't he in his statement claim he went this was to inform the main reception? Who else? Who went to that car park and then went away? Whose car was parked there?

[Martina]

So, you think it was not Madeleine whose scent was followed to the car park?

I don't know whose scent it was but, well.. The abductor parking his car directly under the streetlamp, in the place clearly and perfectly visible from the Ocean Club entrance used by the parents and their friends, and then parading to his perfectly lit and perfecty visible car with the child in his arms - that sounds absurd.

[VIXTE]

I don't know whose scent it was but, well.. The abductor parking his car directly under the streetlamp, in the place clearly and perfectly visible from the Ocean Club entrance used by the parents and their friends, and then parading to his perfectly lit and perfecty visible car with the child in his arms - that sounds absurd.

I've seen a theory on this long time ago on one of the forums, while [ censored word] and pros were still together on the same forum.
That was a brilliant poster, pity I cannot remember the name.
So the theory was: A helper who works in OC and has a key goes into the apartment using the key, opens the window and passes Madeleine through the window. Then hands in pockets and whistling leaves the apartment and goes away by a car, parked next to the reception. The suggestion was that this person touched Madeleine and the towel.

[pegasus]

So, you think it was not Madeleine whose scent was followed to the car park?

And why: because you think someone else touched Madeleine's towel or whatever it was given to the dogs?

Can we conclude this with 100% accuracy? 50%? How many percent this would be truly accurate?

I mean if we are taking hear says as true statements, then we conclude the dogs followed someone else's trail to the car park? Whose trail was this? Has Mr Amaral found it out? It was one of his most significant clues!

So, if not Madeleine's whose trail was this? Matthew Odlfield's? Didn't he in his statement claim he went this was to inform the main reception? Who else? Who went to that car park and then went away? Whose car was parked there?

I don't know what is the correct interpretation of the GNR dogs trails.

One deduction I have made is-
Looking at the trails using the towel (late 4th and late 8th).
Let's give the person whose scent was dominant on the towel, and who the dogs were therefore tracking, the name X (this might be the child or might be someone else).
The towel trails on late 4th and late 8th are the same.
Therefore person X created a scent trail from the front door to the lamppost sometime before late 4th.
But here is the deduction: person X created absolutely no further scent trail, from the front door to anywhere, between late 4th and late 8th.

[Martina]

I've seen a theory on this long time ago on one of the forums, while [banned word] and [banned word] were still together on the same forum.
That was a brilliant poster, pity I cannot remember the name.
So the theory was: A helper who works in OC and has a key goes into the apartment using the key, opens the window and passes Madeleine through the window. Then hands in pockets and whistling leaves the apartment and goes away by a car, parked next to the reception. The suggestion was that this person touched Madeleine and the towel.

Like he couldn't leave with Maddie through the door... No, he just had to choose the way that would look obviously suspicious in the eyes of any accidental witness. And would require sguezing between the cots.

Silvia Batista, Maintenance Services Director:


She recalls that the beds which were in the middle of the room and used by the babies
were aligned and therefore found it strange that someone had taken Madeleine from the bed where she would be sleeping and had gone to the window because there was no space to pass.

[misty]

What we have is Madeleine's scent being tracked by the GNR dogs along routes we have been told she travelled durinng the week.
The search & rescue dogs also followed similar routes, although we are unsure whether it was Madeleine's scent they were tracking.
What the dogs haven't given us is a trail to somewhere that Madeleine was not known to have passed through.
It is crucial to know who gave the Atec towel to the search & rescue handlers - omitted from both the handlers' statements & the GNR final report. Otherwise, the dogs' evidence is worthless.

[Brietta]

I've seen a theory on this long time ago on one of the forums, while [banned word] and [banned word] were still together on the same forum.
That was a brilliant poster, pity I cannot remember the name.
So the theory was: A helper who works in OC and has a key goes into the apartment using the key, opens the window and passes Madeleine through the window. Then hands in pockets and whistling leaves the apartment and goes away by a car, parked next to the reception. The suggestion was that this person touched Madeleine and the towel.

Interesting and plausible.

I have been convinced since first reading about the trail followed by the GNR dogs that they were on to something.  However I have never read anywhere that it was followed up in any way with an investigation into why the dogs lost the trail in exactly the same place which was suggestive of a parked vehicle.
Surely the logical thing to do would have been to use publicity to find out if residents or tourists still in the resort could identify any vehicle parked there.
Might have been a long shot, but who is to say it might not have paid dividends.

[VIXTE]

I don't know what is the correct interpretation of the GNR dogs trails.

One deduction I have made is-
Looking at the trails using the towel (late 4th and late 8th).
Let's give the person whose scent was dominant on the towel, and who the dogs were therefore tracking, the name X (this might be the child or might be someone else).
The towel trails on late 4th and late 8th are the same.
Therefore person X created a scent trail from the front door to the lamppost sometime before late 4th.
But here is the deduction: person X created absolutely no further scent trail, from the front door to anywhere, between late 4th and late 8th.

This was discussed a lot too.. I've seen this theory too.. Whoever's scent this was, the person was no longer near OC because the dogs would find this person. And the person left the area on say 3rd or 4th and never came back. It's only Madeleine? And Mrs Fenn's niece. IMO that is why she was questioned in that way..
First days it was also reported that one of the residents of one of the apartments where the dogs indicated left the area that night but I've never seen anything about that in the files and I was looking for that. So, this was probably the journalist's made up story.

PJ and SY would know through the phone records if anyone like this exists.

[pegasus]

I've seen a theory on this long time ago on one of the forums, while [banned word] and [banned word] were still together on the same forum.
That was a brilliant poster, pity I cannot remember the name.
So the theory was: A helper who works in OC and has a key goes into the apartment using the key, opens the window and passes Madeleine through the window. Then hands in pockets and whistling leaves the apartment and goes away by a car, parked next to the reception. The suggestion was that this person touched Madeleine and the towel.

A human loses about 40,000 skin cells per minute, into the air, many of which get deposited on nearby surfaces, and these (with associated secretions and bacteria) are what I think the GNR dogs were trailing.
Give the dog an item with person X's scent on - and the dog will follow the 1000s of skin cells deposited along the route X took.
If person Y had touched person X, then walked away via some route (not taking X), the dog would not track that route, because Y would not be depositing the required thousands of X's skin cells.

[VIXTE]

Surely the logical thing to do would have been to use publicity to find out if residents or tourists still in the resort could identify any vehicle parked there.
Might have been a long shot, but who is to say it might not have paid dividends.

Even back in 2007 people on forums were asking this.. after so much fuss about it on forums I thought the PJ would have done it.
That time the theory worked because it was thought that the person who took Madeleine was the Tannerman.
If someone lifted Madeleine from her bed and took her away her head would be leaning on the person's right arm and her legs would be on his-hers left side. The Tannerman had the opposite. The girls legs on the right and the head on the left so this is how the theory emerged. Someone has passed Madeleine through the window which would change her position.
At that time few things did not match: the moving doors and the dog's trail. The Tannerman's route was different to the dog's route. I think this is why the PJ did not pay attention on who usually parked the car at the point where the dog's left the trail. As if this was Madeleine's everydays route the dogs would follow the route further, all the way to the creche or wherever. But they stopped there.
This is why someione said there must be 2 people, one who passed Madeleine and still had her scent on and the other who carried Madeleine away.
Someone argued that the 'passer through the window' was Kate, because she said in her book she went to that road that night but then the dogs would follow Kate and they never did.

Now, when they have the phone records in combination with all of this I think they can solve it.