Around midday on Saturday, the Severn Area Rescue Association (SARA) was called to the area of Lancaut Nature Reserve to assist police with a search for a missing man.

Working with Longtown Mountain Rescue Team, and colleagues from the SARA stations at Tewkesbury, Cotswolds and Upton, teams searched the nature reserve. SARA Lifeboat 3 was launched and conducted a search of the river, and the police helicopter also joined the search.

After a period of careful searching of the area, a body was discovered by one of the search parties in woodland below Wintours Leap. In liaison with the police, the body was retrieved from the woodland.

A technical rope system, using SARA’s Larkin Frame, was set up and then used to recover it to the roadside.

A spokesman for SARA said that their thoughts are very much with “the family and friends of the local man concerned”.