Carol Vorderman sparks outrage after comparing Jay Slater's disappearance in Tenerife to time she 'went missing'

Carol Vorderman sparked outrage yesterday after comparing Jay Slater's disappearance in Tenerife to the time she 'went missing'.

The maths whizz, 63, recounted on her LBC show about the time she ran away when Countdown host Richard Whiteley died in 2005, aged 61, as she was racked with grief.

But listeners reacted with anger and accused Vorderman of making the 19-year-old Briton's disappearance 'all about me'.

Speaking to Missing People's head of helplines Paul Joseph about people going missing, Vorderman was close to tears as she told of the time she disappeared: 'Richard Whiteley died, and he died quite suddenly. Every day people would talk to me about him, even though I wasn't with him. There was a great love between us, and I couldn't cope, I just couldn't cope.' 

The TV star said she 'just didn't know what to do' and with her children with her ex-husband at the time she 'just had to disappear'. 

'I didn't want anyone I knew around me, I just got in my car and I drove,' she said. 

'I eventually found a hotel and I didn't have anything with me.

'I had my purse, and just locked myself away then, switch my phone off, all of that. I just stayed in that room, just to get my thoughts together really. 

'So I do understand when people say that that's their only option, I really do. There's no shame about it, that's why I'm telling this story for the first time. There's no shame, everyone has those moments, I believe, at some point.'

Vorderman said Jay's story made her want to look more in to people disappearing and said almost 200,000 are reported missing every year in the UK and 'little attention can be given to them'. 

Her retelling of the story sparked angry comments, reported The Mirror, with one listener saying: 'I don't think this is the same unfortunately,' while another person angrily echoed: 'I don't think this is the same thing Carol!!??' 

Another commented: '"How do I make this all about me?'' and "Me, me, me".' 

MailOnline has contacted Vorderman's representatives for comment. 

It comes as Jay's disappearance has sparked a slew of conspiracy theories and vicious trolling of his family.  

Trolls, amateur sleuths and psychics have sparked a carnival of hysteria and chaos surrounding the investigation by spreading wild and even malicious theories about his disappearance on social media – including the sick idea that he has faked his disappearance to pocket the GoFundMe cash.

Conspiracy theorist David Icke has now waded in making unfounded claims on Facebook about people traffickers and a 'bonkers' cover up claim about it being linked to the power cut at Manchester Airport yesterday, while others have levelled unsubstantiated allegations about possible mafia involvement.

There are also theories about a white car seen in a picture and on Google Streetview - and ridiculous suggestions including he has run away to join ISIS. 

The apprentice bricklayer's family are all on the Spanish island as mountain rescuers with dogs and drones search for him as donations by generous Britons to a fundraising page set up by his best friend to support the search has already passed £32,000.

Specialist search teams have been concentrating on an area at the bottom of a ravine in Rural de Teno Park - the area where his phone was last tracked to before it ran out of battery.

Police are working on the theory that he has got lost after attending a three-day high energy music festival, with the teenager later being seen walking away from Playa de las Americas.

He had called his best friend Lucy Law, who was on holiday with him, that he 'didn't know where he was', was thirsty and only had 1% battery left on his phone.

Jay Slater's mother Debbie Duncan has repeatedly hit out at trolls mocking her missing son and raised her own concerns that it is distracting from the hunt for her missing boy.