Grandmother and boy pulled dead from pond

Yesterday, Lincolnshire Police revealed that the discoveries had followed a search on land and by RAF helicopter at Holywell village, near Castle Bytham, south of Grantham, in Lincolnshire.

The alarm was raised by the boy’s mother as he did not come home at the expected time after he went to spend a night with his grandmother during the half-term break.

He went on Wednesday evening and was due back about 24 hours later.

Officers said that after the call from the boy’s mother at 9.20pm on Thursday, they went to the elderly woman’s home in Castle Bytham.

No-one was there so the search – involving the helicopter – began for the missing pair and the grandmother’s car.

About an hour-and-a-half later, officers found the car near the duck pond in the village.

Soon afterwards, the body of a woman was recovered from the water, known locally as Holywell Lake. Despite efforts to resuscitate her, she was certified dead at the scene.

The search for the boy continued into the night.

Just before 4am yesterday, Lincolnshire Police underwater search unit officers recovered the body of a child from the pond.

A police spokesman said: “The circumstances surrounding the deaths are being investigated and post-mortems will be carried out in due course.”

Formal identifications will not be concluded until Monday and the names of the victims were not released yesterday.