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Body of British father who drowned after saving son found in Lake Garda

‘This man was a hero and at last now he can be reunited with his family,’ Lake Garda coastguard says

Rory Sullivan
Wednesday 17 August 2022 14:18 BST
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Aran Chada died on a family holiday in the Italian lakes
Aran Chada died on a family holiday in the Italian lakes (Supplied)

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The body of a British father who drowned in an Italian lake last month while rescuing his teenage son has been found.

Aran Chada, a sales director from Leicestershire, was on holiday with his family when the tragedy occurred on 22 July.

The 51-year-old dived into Lake Garda when he noticed his 14-year-old son had got into difficulty.

After dragging him back to their rental boat, Mr Chada disappeared beneath the surface of the lake, possibly after suffering a seizure.

The coastguard has now announced they have retrieved a body they believe to be his from the bottom of the lake.

It has yet to be formally identified.

It took a team of coastguards and diving specialists armed with a robot and sonar equipment almost a month to locate his body, which was found at a depth of 300 metres.

The work was “very complex” because of the depth of the lake, according to Antonio Ragadale, the head of the coastguard.

Mr Ragadale told the MailOnline that the operation “was the least we could do because he had been so brave in diving into the lake when he saw his son get into trouble”.

“This man was a hero and at last now he can be reunited with his family. We had vowed we would carry on for the sake of them and we have done our duty,” he added.

Mr Chada died days before he and his family were due to celebrate his 52nd birthday.

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