'The most loving, caring, kind person': Tributes to man killed in Sharm El Sheikh diving accident
The grief-stricken family of a man who died during a diving course in Egypt have spoken of their heartbreak.
Andrew Maybury, aged 34, got into difficulties on his first open water dive while on holiday in Sharm El Sheikh in March this year.
At an inquest last week Birmingham coroner Emma Brown recorded a verdict of accidental death.
Andrew – a former student of Lapal Primary School, Leasowes High and Halesowen College – travelled to the Egyptian resort in March this year with partner Kate Wright, 31.
Finance manager Andrew had completed half of his dive training in the UK before jetting out to Egypt. However, the inquest heard his instructor at Lodge Scuba was not properly qualified and had subsequently been dismissed.
Andrew had also taken a written test, but this had been done remotely and unsupervised.
He was due to complete four dives while in Egypt to be fully qualified – but tragedy struck on his first when he was around 30ft under the water.
HR manager Miss Wright was taking part in her own series of dives elsewhere when she was told the news.
She said: "When I heard it was just shock – I didn't know what was happening to me.
"People were talking to me but I didn't know who anybody was."
Miss Wright stayed for a week in the resort while waiting for Andrew's body to be repatriated to the UK.
The pair, who met through work, were hoping to buy a house together next year and had agreed a mortgage in principle.
Miss Wright said: "It was just meant to be a relaxing time together.
"Getting away was important because it meant we got to spend good quality time together, with just the two of us."
Paying tribute to her son Mrs Maybury, from Halesowen, who turned 67 on Saturday, four days after the inquest, said: "He was the most loving, caring, kind person.
"He thought the world of everybody and never had a bad word to say about anybody.
"If he could help anybody he would go out of his way to do it."
Andrew's father Frederick, 76, said the inquest had left questions unanswered. "It didn't tell us a lot more than what we knew from seven or eight months ago," he added.
Mr and Mrs Maybury questioned what impact deficiencies in Andrew's training may have had and how quickly emergency services reached their son. Mrs Maybury said: "There's only really one person who knows what happened and that's Andrew."
