Man’s body is found in lake
Last updated at 15:12, Friday, 18 June 2010
THE body of a man has been found in Coniston Water.
Police received a call at around 6.40pm yesterday to an incident at the Coniston Hall Campsite and Sailing Club in Coniston.
A 19-year-old man from Leicestershire, who was on holiday at the campsite, went missing while swimming in the lake. Witnesses said he was swimming with a woman when he got into difficulty. She raised the alarm when he failed to resurface.
Ambulance, fire and police crews attended the scene and were joined by a team of police divers shortly after 9.10pm.
A Cumbria police spokesman today said: “We had a report from someone at the caravan site that she had been swimming, and someone swimming with her had been lost under water. A body has been recovered and the deceased has been taken to the mortuary at Barrow where a post-mortem will take place today.”
The spokesman said the body had been seen on the bottom of the lake at 7.15pm last night by a member of the public who had dived in.
At 7.30pm, the site was marked with a buoy. People were moved from the area so the body could be recovered by police divers.
The body was taken to Furness General Hospital at 11.30pm.
A group of students visiting the site from Lancaster University described the scene as a commotion. Joanne Foster, of Stoke, was on the campsite when the alarm was raised.
Miss Foster said: “We were going to go and have a look but we could hear a girl screaming.
“We saw fire engines tearing through the site and people running with boats.”
Another member of the group said a woman ran from the lake after the man got into difficulty.
He said: “We didn’t see what was happening, a woman ran over to a nearby tent to get help, it was quite a commotion.”
Ray Glover, who was visiting the campsite from Yeovil, said he had just pitched his tent when he realised something was wrong. He said: “We just got here and put our tent up when we heard screaming. The next minute a police car pulled up with an ambulance behind it and two fire vehicles.”
A member of staff at the site said the man had been swimming with friends when he disappeared. He said: “There were three of them, two girls and a boy, they were out swimming when the boy went under the water and did not return to the surface.”
First published at 13:05, Friday, 18 June 2010
Published by http://www.nwemail.co.uk
