FAMILY and friends of a young man who died after falling into the River Wye have presented a cheque to the volunteer rescue team who searched for him.

A mini-music festival was organised in memory of Rikki Baldwin by members of the Forest of Dean Outlaws and Road Warriors motorcycle clubs to raise money for the Severn Area Rescue Association (SARA).

SARA members were quickly on the scene after the 24-year-old from Sedbury fell from the A48 bridge in the early hours of Easter Monday last year. They joined other emergency services to comb the river bank and search the water.

The event at the Royal Oak pub in Whitecroft raised more than £400 which will go towards keeping SARA's rescue team operational.

They presented a cheque for £436 to SARA area commander Mervyn Fleming at the Beachley station.

Rikki's mum, Clare Morgan, said: "SARA were absolutely brilliant. They did everything possible to find Rikki and they never gave up hope, even when they had to scale down the search.

"I hope that other families never have to go through what we have, but we will always be grateful to SARA."

The fund-raising event took place at the Royal Oak earlier this month and featured a number of bands from the area and from further afield as well as family entertainment.

Ms Morgan said: "We'd like to say a massive thank you to all the staff at the Royal Oak who worked so hard, Vinnie Buckingham who organised the bands at short notice and Simon Williams at the Village Inn in Sedbury."

Mr Fleming said it costs about £25,000 a year to keep the Beachley station running.

He said: "We recently got some government money through Mountain Rescue which will insure 11 of our vehicles but the bulk of the money to run SARA comes from public donations."