THE death of a Scartho man who was taken ill while swimming off Humberston Fitties has been described as an "unfortunate accident".
Lorry driver Mark Knights, 44, was part of a group of six friends who planned to swim out to Haile Sands Fort, in the mouth of the Humber, and then back again during low tide.
Despite being a strong swimmer, Mr Knights got into difficulty and was unconscious when he was dragged onto the beach by his friends at about 9pm on Wednesday.
Emergency services attempted to revive him and he was airlifted to Hull Royal Infirmary, but was pronounced dead shortly afterwards.
Jack Barlow, lifeboat operations manager for Cleethorpes RNLI, said: "Normally in these circumstances we would issue a safety warning, but in this case it seems to have been an unfortunate accident.
"The gentleman was a strong swimmer, he was wearing the appropriate equipment, it was the right time of day, and he was part of a group.
"The water was low, there was a slack tide and they weren't doing anything stupid.
"They were only swimming a distance of 200 yards or so.
"The only thing that could have been done differently would have been having somebody on the shore watching them.
"However, his friends raised the alarm as quickly as possible and everything was done to try to save him."
Mr Knights was a driver for Links Taxis until about a year ago when he began working as a lorry driver.
He lived on Scartho Top with his wife.
Mr Barlow added: "The gentleman's friends told us that he was the strongest swimmer out of the lot of them and he does a lot of surfing.
"They did all the right things and it seems that this is a very sad accident.
"Our thoughts are with everybody involved."Follow us on Facebook and Twitter
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