The artificial scent of bubblegum was being pumped out over the landfill site to disguise the stench of decomposition. Eight police officers, dressed in white boiler suits and masks, were poking through the rubbish. They were looking for a clue, any clue, as to what happened to Corrie Mckeague. It had emerged the bin lorry that had travelled from the Horseshoe to the landfill site had a load of more than 100kg, rather than 11kg as first thought. It was therefore possible Corrie had been inside. A 26-year-old Biffa employee was arrested in March on suspicion of perverting the course of justice but was later released without charge. It seemed the data error had been accidental.

For Corrie’s loved ones, the discovery was a devastating blow. Any last hope he might have gone absent without leave, or chosen to hide away somewhere, seemed to have been extinguished. Their torment grew as the search dragged on for months. Corrie's mother and brothers could not face visiting the landfill site, but his father regularly travelled down from Cupar to be near the search. "With every lift of the bucket - the jaws of the excavator - there’s every chance Corrie could be lifted in that," he said. However, on 21 July, after more than four months, the search was finally called off.

Within days, 25,000 people had signed a petition calling for the search to be resumed. Corrie's father even went to the lengths of blockading it with his motorhome, hoping to persuade police to change their mind. Police insisted the decision to call the search off was not due to the cost, which was more than £1.2m. They said they had exhausted the area where Corrie's body was most likely to be - but there was no evidence to support any theory "other than that Corrie was in the bin". However, there has been criticism from several quarters.

Corrie's brothers, Makeyan and Darroch, with their mother Nicola

Nicola said she was "angry... beyond devastated" at being "misled" by police, saying: "They truly had me believing that he’s in there." "I can live with Corrie never being found - any parent would just find a way of coping with that - but that’s on the back of knowing that everything has been done to try to find them," she added. "Why waste £1m searching if you’re not going to finish it?" Former Met officer Mr Sutton said: "It seems pretty self-evident if you're actually committed to [the search], and you believe you know where he is, then keep looking there. "We were told that money is not the issue so, if it isn't the issue, then I don't see any good reason for stopping."

Police were arguably facing an uphill battle though. The 120-acre site takes in 96,000 tonnes of waste each year and - in some places - the rubbish is 26ft (8m) deep. Officers were able to locate the section where waste from Bury St Edmunds would have been deposited, but even this took months to search. The five-month delay between Corrie's disappearance and the start of the search would also have hindered their efforts. Forensic pathologist Dr Stuart Hamilton said if Corrie's body had been crushed in the lorry, it would have decomposed at a faster rate. It would also have made it difficult to carry out tests if his remains were found. "A lot of information will have been lost, and there would be a greater potential for contamination," he said. "Even if a fresh body [was in the landfill], there’s so much DNA going on [in the waste], the potential for contamination is huge." A scrap of clothing, a shoelace, a mobile phone cover, could all have answered the questions they were asking. But there was nothing. Suffolk Police have said no new rubbish will be disposed of in the area where they have been searching until a review of the investigation has been carried out.

Corrie's father Martin and stepmother Trisha