Monday, December 21, 2009

A man has been killed after a car accident in Cornwall, England. The collision involved a vehicle driving off a quay in Porthleven, near the town of Helston in the county and into the sea at around 2100 Greenwich Mean Time on Friday, according to reports from members of the public made to the police and the coastguard.

A major rescue operation was launched with contributions from the harbourmaster, the ambulance service, the police, the fire crews, a helicopter and the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. After roughly two hours, a harbour crane lifted the vehicle out of the water that it had crashed into. It transpired that the man was the only occupant of the vehicle. It is believed that no other vehicles were involved in the incident. The man was taken to the Royal Cornwall Hospital, which is situated in Truro, by ambulance. However, on arrival, he was pronounced dead.

Now tributes are being paid to 20-year-old Jamie Hocking after his death. The family of the man have said that he will be “truly missed by all who knew him”, describing Jamie with the words “loveable rogue”. The family also expressed their thanks to people offering sympathy messages and support from others, as well as the emergency services who assisted at the scene of the accident. Devon and Cornwall Constabulary are now asking any people who know of any information relating to the incident to contact them as soon as possible.

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Representatives from the British insurance industry have said that the cost of the earthquake which hit Britain early yesterday could be over 10 million GBP. The Association of British Insurers has said in a statement that the cost for the earthquake is “likely to run into the low tens of millions of pounds.”

The Senior claims manager at the UK bank Norwich Union has described the damage by saying that at the moment most insurance claims regarding the earthquake describe “minor damage such as tiles off roofs, breakages inside the homes and brick walls collapsing.” It has also been reported that approximately 1,200 insurance claims were made in the first twelve hours after the earthquake hit Britain.

These reports come one day after the United Kingdom was hit by a 5.2 earthquake. Tremors were reported as widespread as Edinburgh, Manchester, Sheffield, Middlesbrough, Cambridge, London, Birmingham and Southampton .