Sussex Police come to rescue of elderly driver stuck in mud for five hours

An elderly driver was trapped in mud for more than five hours after becoming lost trying to avoid flooded roads.

The 82-year old Dorset man was driving his Jaguar from Newhaven towards his home when he was diverted off the A27 at Chichester due to surface flooding at 10.40pm on Sunday, February 10 and became stuck in an isolated rural area.

Sussex Police officers at first struggled to locate the man because of darkness and bad weather and the man’s  mobile phone had gone flat.

He was finally located at just before 3.30am this morning (February 11) after officers in the police control room carried out a detailed analysis of electronic records from his call and managed to establish his exact whereabouts in Norwood Lane between Graffham and East Lavington close to Midhurst.

A police 4x4 then pulled the car clear and he was able to carry on his journey home without any need for medical attention.

 

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Comments(11)

wm2694 says...
12:11pm Mon 11 Feb 13

"Sussex Police officers at first struggled to locate the man because of darkness and bad and the man’s flat battery on his mobile phone had gone flat."

That makes total sense...

NickBrt says...
12:20pm Mon 11 Feb 13

Sarah Brooker will tell you it's Argus House Style.

Sarah Booker Lewis says...
12:37pm Mon 11 Feb 13

The story was uploaded directly by the reporter. The sentence is correct now.

Tailgaters Anonymous says...
12:44pm Mon 11 Feb 13

Moral of this tale, if you choose to get stuck in mud or lost avoid Sussex at all costs!
Pity for the elderly gentleman and trust Sussex finest offer some tangible sign of regret at their incompetence!

Al Bion says...
1:05pm Mon 11 Feb 13

I'm afraid it's not right, Sarah.
It still reads: "the man’s flat battery on his mobile phone had gone flat."

emma_barnes says...
1:17pm Mon 11 Feb 13

Tailgaters Anonymous wrote:
Moral of this tale, if you choose to get stuck in mud or lost avoid Sussex at all costs!
Pity for the elderly gentleman and trust Sussex finest offer some tangible sign of regret at their incompetence!
what ?

jesss2012 says...
1:49pm Mon 11 Feb 13

Tailgaters Anonymous wrote:
Moral of this tale, if you choose to get stuck in mud or lost avoid Sussex at all costs!
Pity for the elderly gentleman and trust Sussex finest offer some tangible sign of regret at their incompetence!
I think the moral of this story is..if you can afford to drive a Jaguar...go the whole hog and splash out on a satnav too...unless thats the very reason he was so lost.

paul76 says...
2:11pm Mon 11 Feb 13

Tailgaters Anonymous wrote:
Moral of this tale, if you choose to get stuck in mud or lost avoid Sussex at all costs! Pity for the elderly gentleman and trust Sussex finest offer some tangible sign of regret at their incompetence!
So having been given no clear location or directions of where the man was, you are having a go at the police for not finding him sooner.

I am guessing they had to drive around miles of country lanes in the rough area of where the man thought he was trying to locate him.

And at what point did his mobile die? If it was half way through telling them where he was, they had little chance of finding him easily did they?

mimseycal says...
3:59pm Mon 11 Feb 13

Well done Sussex Police for persevering. Glad the gent eventually got home in one piece and without the need for medical care.

AmboGuy says...
6:45pm Mon 11 Feb 13

Tailgaters Anonymous wrote:
Moral of this tale, if you choose to get stuck in mud or lost avoid Sussex at all costs!
Pity for the elderly gentleman and trust Sussex finest offer some tangible sign of regret at their incompetence!
Yaaaaawn

One of your usual knee-jerk anti Police statements.

Just because you come from a 'problem family' and have had many run ins with the Police doesn't mean we want to hear your rubbish all the time.

Dave At Home says...
10:21pm Mon 11 Feb 13

wm2694 wrote:
"Sussex Police officers at first struggled to locate the man because of darkness and bad and the man’s flat battery on his mobile phone had gone flat."

That makes total sense...
The man's mobile phone had gone flat now, nothing about the battery draining of losing power, it just went flat. Maybe reporters should do the work themselves instead of copy and pasting, at least they can say they tried and as for the old bill leaving this bloke lost for 5 hours, I suppose if we still had the helicopter based at Shoreham it could have made a sweep of the area but as it's based elsewhere now.....

click2find

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