A RESCUE helicopter from RAF Wattisham has found two missing British yachtsmen a few miles off Orford today.The men were found safe and well at 5.15am, around 40 miles from their destination of Harwich.

A RESCUE helicopter from RAF Wattisham has found two missing British yachtsmen a few miles off Orford today.

The men were found safe and well at 5.15am, around 40 miles from their destination of Harwich. It is thought their radio had lost power.

The search, involving the coastguard fixed wing aircraft, three RNLI lifeboats and the rescue helicopter, began at 4.30 pm yesterday afternoon when the wife of the skipper of the vessel Gentle Jane called the coastguard to report that he had been due home and had not arrived.

The coastguard then contacted the wife of the other man onboard who reported that her husband had said that he would not be home until 2.30am.

They began a communications search to establish contact with the two men, both experienced yachtsmen, by contacting Thames and Dover Coastguard as well as their colleagues in Holland and Belgium. The men had been sailing the vessel from Ijmuden in Holland to Harwich.

Mick Carpenter, Thames Coastguard watch manager said: “I am very relieved to say that we have just found the two yachtsmen safe and well, about 40 miles from their destination. The helicopter located their vessel and the Harwich RNLI lifeboat has just rendezvoused with them.”