Photographs show police digging inside a barn at a Hertfordshire farm as they search for the remains of Muriel McKay, who was murdered in 1969.

Ms McKay, the wealthy wife of newspaper executive Alick McKay, was kidnapped and held ransom for £1 million more than 54 years ago.

The people who kidnapped her had mistaken her for Anna Murdoch, the then-wife of media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

Images released by the Met Police on Monday show officers sifting through the dirt in a trench dug inside a barn at the farm to where Ms McKay was traced.

Black and white head and shoulders shot of a woman
Muriel McKay was the wealthy wife of newspaper executive Alick McKay (PA)

Other photographs show a mini digger inside the barn, and officers moving soil in wheelbarrows.

Alick McKay, who was Mr Murdoch’s deputy, was also Australian.

His 55-year-old wife Muriel disappeared in December 1969 and was traced to Stocking Farm near Bishop’s Stortford in Hertfordshire.

Her body has never been found.

A small digger diggers up the earth in a barn
Police searching inside a barn at a Hertfordshire farm (Met Police/PA)

Brothers Arthur and Nizamodeen Hosein were convicted of her kidnap and murder.

Arthur died in prison in 2009, and Nizamodeen was deported to Trinidad and Tobago after serving his sentence.

The farm was searched at the time of the murder and again in 2022, with 30 police officers, ground penetrating radar and specialist forensic archaeologists used, but nothing new was found.

A fresh search started at the farm in Stocking Pelham on Monday.

Two men wheel wheelbarrows near a barn
Police searching a barn at a Hertfordshire farm for the remains of Muriel McKay (Met Police/PA)

Officers from the Met’s Specialist Crime Command and forensic officers will work with forensic archaeologists and other specialists, as well as Hertfordshire Police.

Muriel McKay’s grandson, Mark Dyer, told BBC Breakfast: “It’s difficult not to get anxious and emotional but I’ve got to keep on the straight and narrow.

“Really, if we don’t find her it will be a disappointment but it won’t be unexpected.

“But without searching for something you’re never going to find it.

“We haven’t dug behind the barn, no-one’s ever dug behind the barn.”

The search is expected to take about five days but could be extended.

An air exclusion zone will be in place during the dig, with no access to the farm or to a section of public footpath that runs through it.