WAR reporter Terry Lloyd, feared dead after he was caught in a terrifying Iraqi gun ambush, spent some of his early reporting career in Ipswich.The ITN veteran reporter, who also covered the Gulf war, vanished along with his two colleagues after they were trapped in a ferocious hail of bullets from troops they thought were surrendering.

By Victoria Knowles

WAR reporter Terry Lloyd, feared dead after he was caught in a terrifying Iraqi gun ambush, spent some of his early reporting career in Ipswich.

The ITN veteran reporter, who also covered the Gulf war, vanished along with his two colleagues after they were trapped in a ferocious hail of bullets from troops they thought were surrendering.

Terry, 51, worked for a freelance news agency in Ipswich back in the mid 70s along with Stuart Jarrold and worked in the area for a couple of years.

"I did know him and we socialised together for probably a year or two. He was a great bloke and was always ambitious and we both worked together supplying stories for the nationals.

"He was a bright journalist and always had it in him to be successful.

"This is just a very sad situation and we can only hope that he will be found," said Mr Jarrold.

He, along with two others, went missing as they drove towards the key Iraqi city of Basra.

Daniel Demoustier, a cameraman who was in the car with Terry told how disaster struck on the road to Basra, the crucial port in southern Iraq where allied troops are battling.

"I could see two Iraq vehicles following us. They were a couple of miles behind but then they over took us and were making thumbs-up signs.

"But at that moment the gun fire started. I stayed in the car which went into the ditch about 200m further on. It caught fire and I jumped out into the ditch just as it blew up.

"I stayed in the ditch for a while. I really hope Terry managed to jump out of the car and escape somehow."

The son of a Derby policeman, Terry joined ITN in 1983 working as a reporter for Central Television. In a career spanning two decades he has become an award-winning reporter who has tackled some of the most dramatic and dangerous reporting in modern times.

Terry was the first reporter inside the Iraqi town of Halabje during the Gulf war after Saddam Hussein had dropped a chemical bomb on the Kurdish people. The images of devastation revealed in his broadcasts shocked the world and revealed the previously unknown extent of Saddam's brutality.

He and his cameraman were also the first reporters inside war-torn Kosovo when they scaled a treacherous mountain range to get in.

In March 1994 he reported on the discovery of mass graves at Ovcara near Vukovar, containing thousands of bodies in Croatia.

Terry was also close to his brother Kevin Lloyd - The Bill's Tosh Lines -Kevin Lloyd, who died nearly five years ago after a long battle with alcohol.

Lloyd's wife, Lynn is waiting for news back home in Buckinghamshire. A family friend said: "Lynn is beside herself and we are clinging to the hope that Terry is somehow still alive."