AS a heavy mist lifted from the lonely mountain road in Blaenavon where the body of missing schoolgirl Jenna Baldwin was found, a JCB digger moved in.

It has come to "make good" the spot where the 15-year-old was discovered in a shallow grave a week ago.

At first light on Saturday, men from Monmouthshire council tried to repair the damage done in the layby and open it to drivers, walkers and mourners.

They brought more than four tonnes of gravel to tip on the area. The grim site is protected by a canopy of 50ft trees and foliage.

Keith Lewis, Tim Keogh and Stuart Roberts, carefully temporarily removed around 20 floral tributes, pictured, left by family, close friends and strangers, and placed them on the opposite side of the road.

Mr Keogh, a roadman, said: "I've never been involved in anything like this before. I've seen some things in the past but nothing as serious as this."

His colleague, Mr Lewis, a stonemason, lives not far from the scene and saw the lights used by police as they worked through the night to identify Jenna.

He said: "I can't believe it's happened on my own doorstep - it's too close to home."

Then Mr Roberts reversed his yellow JCB in and began to scrape away soil.

The area is sodden from torrential downpours and inches thick in mud which is tainted an orange-red colour from clay in the ground. A mini-stream has formed only feet from Jenna's shallow grave after a drainage pipe broke and water is now flowing into the road.

The area was once overgrown and out of sight from the road. But police are thought to have cut it all back to reach Jenna.

All that remains is mud and a mound of loose soil purposefully covered with branches and leafy twigs.

The Abersychan teenager disappeared from her home 11 weeks ago.

After an intensive police search officers found her remains beneath some stones at Fiddler's Elbow on the site of the derelict Puddler's Arms pub.

The dead girl's stepfather, Michael Baldwin, 36, of Limekiln Road, Pontnewynydd, has been charged with her murder.