A British tourist has gone missing while on holiday after reportedly leaving a hotel with just his snorkel and flippers, on Tuesday afternoon.
A desperate rescue mission has been launched after Mark Davis Morris, 44, is believed to have gone for a swim alone while on a freediving trip in the Philippines. Mr Morris reportedly set off from his holiday rental apartment in Negros Oriental, a region of the Philippines known for its natural beauty, but his worried wife Emily Tan, 42, filed a police report on Wednesday morning after he failed to return. Ms Tan, a Singapore resident, said her husband left, while she was asleep that day, and told a friend he had gone diving alone.
Mr Morris is believed to have vanished on the waters at the Lalao Beach, where search and rescue teams have set up a command centre to spearhead the mission to find him. Crews riding rubber boats were seen scouring the waters by Dauin town and nearby seaside villages.
Despite this, the mystery depends as authorities added that they were also instigating whether Mr Morris had actually gone diving, as beachgoers at the time claimed they did not seen the Brit plunge into the water.
Three dives have also been conducted by both local and foreign professionals but there has been no sign of the missing Brit so far. Lieutenant Marionne Abigail Enopia, commander of the Coast Guard Negros Oriental station, said: “Our Coast Guard (CG) personnel in Dauin and Zamboanguita, together with the municipal disaster risk reduction and management office (DRRMO), conducted a search early Wednesday after receiving reports of the missing person.”
This has not been the only tragic case of a Brit who has unexpectedly gone missing while on holiday. 26-year-old Alexandra Clarke disappeared after a fire ripped through a wooden dive boat she was on in Thailand, last month.
Clarke, from Lambeth, had been backpacking at the time but disaster struck after she was reportedly using a toilet on the doomed boat when the blaze ignited.
The fire started from the engine of the wooden vessel near Koh Tao and police believe the boat’s fuel tank overflowed with it was refilled during the journey, causing the inferno to spark.
The captain and crew of the vessel have since been charged with negligence. Although she was missing authorities fears the Londoner could be dead.
Meanwhile human remains were discovered after a shark is believed to have attacked a diver in Israel on April 21. A huge search mission was launched after a man disappeared in the water at Olga Beach in Hadera.
The Fire and Rescue Authority confirmed on April 22 that a body, believed to be that of the 40-year-old man, had been recovered. Beachgoers had reported seeing fins circling in the water in the hours before the incident.
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