JUST as there’s no safe mountain, there’s no safe river, a coroner said when recording that a university student died accidentally after kayaking in a swollen and fast moving river.

Tom Lloyd, 24, drowned in the River Glaslyn in what is known as the Aberglaslyn Gorge, near Beddgelert, last September.

Tom, a Bangor student from Lichfield, had got out of his capsizing kayak and was swept downriver, crashing against jagged rocks.

Coroner Dewi Pritchard Jones said he was sure he had already drowned before his colleague Jack Swann could reach him. Such was the strength of the current it would be impossible to swim against it, he added.

Tom’s foot had become wedged between rocks, and conditions were so dangerous that a fire brigade water unit had to wait until the river was lower the next day before extricating him.

At the inquest in Caernarfon last week, the coroner said: “I’m very conscious of the fact these two were well aware of the risks because of their love of the activity.

”I can’t deter people from doing this, the risk and excitement is part of the sport.”

In evidence, Mr Swann described how they had done three or four laps of a 300-metre section then got out and repeated it. But Tom’s kayak capsized in one of the rapids and he couldn’t right it.

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