MOTORISTS watched in horror as a man plunged to his death off the Orwell Bridge.Suffolk police received a number of calls from members of the public who reported seeing a man jump from the bridge at 7.

MOTORISTS watched in horror as a man plunged to his death off the Orwell Bridge.

Suffolk police received a number of calls from members of the public who reported seeing a man jump from the bridge at 7.23pm yesterday.

Officers attended the scene and discovered a man believed to be about 50 years old lying on grass at The Strand, Wherstead. He was pronounced dead at the scene.

Police said no further information would be released until the man's next of kin had been informed and he had been formally identified.

A spokesman for the force said: "At 7.23pm this evening police received a number of calls from the public stating a male had jumped from the Orwell Bridge.

"Police attended and found a male approximately 50 years old lying on the grass at The Strand, Wherstead.

"He was pronounced dead at the scene."

In 21 years, the toll of those who have leapt from the concrete parapets of the Orwell Bridge now stands at 26.

The last of those involved the tragic sequence of events that led Dr Jaya Prakash Chiti to jump off the bridge with his two-year-old son Pranau earlier this year.

Police believe the doctor murdered his 36-year-old wife Anupama Chiti at the couple's home in Seckford Close, Rushmere St Andrew.

The bridge has become a notorious suicide spot since it was opened in November 1982.