Authorities have called off the search for a British doctor who went missing in a French mountain range last week.
Tom Doherty, 67, from St Albans in Hertfordshire, had been hiking and camping alone in the French Pyrenees when he went missing on August 6.
Doherty had texted family members saying: “Help, I’ve fallen and cannot [m]ove” – the last message they received before losing contact with him.
The message triggered a wide-ranging mountain rescue operation, with sniffer dogs and helicopters frantically scouring the Col d’Escots pass in the Pyrenees’ Ariege region, just over the Spanish border.
It has been almost a week since Tom Doherty vanished
PA
Earlier today, French authorities announced that the search had been suspended, with a representative from the local prosecutor’s office saying: “After five days, we haven’t managed to find him.”
Doherty had left his second home in Bergerac in southwest France to embark on the solo expedition on August 3.
Throughout his trip, he had been updating his family with photos of the mountains through which he was walking.
Last Tuesday, Doherty shared a series of photos on a family WhatsApp group chat – with his daughter detailing how relatives last heard from him at 7.07pm.
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Doherty’s family shared screenshots of his last message to the family’s group chat
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Three days ago, Rachel had said: “He was sending us a few pictures of the scenery and then on Tuesday afternoon sent us one of clouds coming over the top of a mountain. He said: ‘bugger.’
“We told him to be careful and urged him to come down.
“The last time we heard from him was Tuesday. He told us he had fallen and couldn’t move – that’s all we’ve had since. The search party have found his car.”
His daughter said the family had been left “worried and extremely concerned for his welfare” – while Doherty’s wife Anne Lyons immediately reached to French authorities, who sent specialists from the Peloton de Gendarmerie de Haute Montagne (PGHM) into the area to kick-start the search.
Doherty’s family had been left “worried and extremely concerned for his welfare”
PA
French authorities sent specialists from the Peloton de Gendarmerie de Haute Montagne (PGHM) into the area
PA
One of Doherty’s last photos shared with his family was this picture of the mountains
PA
On Thursday, Lyons told French TV her husband was an experienced walker – but counselled that he is not a mountaineer, and hadn’t carried extensive gear with him on his trip.
The search had been complicated authorities’ inability to pinpoint the 67-year-old’s phone location, prompting family members to try and gain access to his Apple account to find him through photos of the area automatically backed up online.
A spokesperson for the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said: “We are supporting the family of a British man missing in France and are in touch with the local authorities.”
The local prosecutor’s office has said the investigation into Doherty’s disappearance will continue.
Source Agencies
