Missing backpacker: parents tell of anguish

When Hannah Timmings, a young executive working for Viscount Linley, was offered the chance to go on a six-month backpacking tour she snapped it up.

Now, however, the 28-year-old's family are facing up to the news that they will never see her again, 10 days after she went missing on a helicopter tour.

Today they spoke for the first time about their anguish.

Ms Timmings, a project manager for Lord Linley's furniture business, set off on a helicopter tour of New Zealand's South Island peaks on 3 January. All radio contact was suddenly lost and nothing has been heard since.

Despite a hunt by specially trained search teams, not a trace of the helicopter or Ms Timmings and her friend has been found, forcing her family to confront the reality they have most feared.

Today, Ms Timmings's aunt admitted her family had virtually given up hope.

Sue Harding, who flew to the remote region last week with Ms Timmings's father, 56-year-old Phillip, from Gloucestershire, said that after seeing the jagged terrain they now believe she could not have survived a crash. "From what we have been told by police, there is no likelihood that Hannah will be found alive," Mrs Harding told the Evening Standard.

"We are devastated, absolutely devastated, but are having to accept what they say. All we want to do now is find Hannah and bring her home."

Speaking from their motel in the small mountain resort of Te Anau, Mrs Harding described Hannah as an "absolutely lovely and loving girl" who adored adventure and the outdoor life.

She added that delays in the search, caused by poor weather conditions, had been " heartbreaking".

"The problem has been the water levels after flooding," she said. "There has been so much rain, wind and flooding that it has hampered the search. It has been terrible waiting, not being able to go out and look."

Nine teams of policemen today embarked on a ground search, but so far they have uncovered nothing. It is not clear how long they will continue to look.

Hannah had met up with a friend, Campbell Montgomerie, 27, who lived on the North Island and was a qualified helicopter pilot.

On Saturday 3 January, the pair took off from near an isolated mountain hut where they had stayed the night, to fly to a nearby town.

But an hour after take-off, they flew into thick cloud and radioed the local control tower for directions. After the control tower had given instructions they waited for a reply from the chopper, but by then the radio had gone dead.

Miss Timmings had planned to make her visit to New Zealand more permanent. This week she was due to meet a contact of Viscount Linley to discuss working in the furniture business in New Zealand.

The National Park over which she and Mr Montgomerie were flying covers more than 1.3 million hectares with vertical mountain walls, swamps, thick trees and freezing night temperatures.

The terrain is so rugged that as many as seven aircraft have crashed there over the years and have never been found.

A signal from the helicopter's locator beacon which is usually given off in a crash, has also failed to go off.