Warwickshire police put out an appeal last week for information, after the body of Adam Lobb was found floating in the canal near Stratford-upon-Avon on August 6th, and an initial post mortem put the cause of death as 'unexplained'.
They issued a fuzzy photo of the 28 year old (right), showing him looking handsome and confident in the snow, wearing a beanie hat and camouflage clothing.
He seems to have been living for some time on a small, scruffy cruiser near the bottom of the Wilmcote lock flight. They want to hear from anyone who was in the area in the week before his death and might be able to give them some clues.
To help jog memories they also put out a photo of the boat, and it's this that marked it out for me as interesting. The police said the photo came from British Waterways, and it comes with a load of data imprinted in the top left and clearly shows a 'Section 8' notice tied to the canopy.
The data suggests the photo was taken on August 5th, only the day before Lobb's body was discovered in the canal.
And I presume it was taken by the licence patrol officer who tied the notice to the boat, with the geodata embedded to prove that he/she had been there and delivered the note.
My mind slipped into a ruminative gear, wondering if he was still alive at that time, if he was nearby, if he was perhaps hiding or asleep on the boat, or if he was about to come back and discover the notice.
Or even if he was watching, from a distance, as the officer tied the notice to the boat.
Whatever happened, I'd imagine the patrol officer is now rather sweating!
I entered the coordinates given in the photo (052.2068, -001.7367) into Google Maps here and Bing Maps here, and they do indeed correspond with a location halfway up the towpath to Wilmcote Bottom Lock.
These notices are the equivalent of parking tickets. I can't know what was in the note attached to Lobb's boat; however, mostly they can be quite benign, often simply stating that the owner has overstayed his welcome in a particular area, and demanding that he moves his boat.
That's the circumstance of the envelope (below), and the note inside it, which I discovered on an abandoned and sunken boat on the Grand Union a few years back.
Sheer nosiness curiosity made me look inside the envelope, which was unsealed, to examine and photograph the notice, before carefully replacing it (see below; I've obscured the identifying information).
I thought to myself: 'How stupid to put a note like this on a sunken boat! How are they going to move it anyway?
It makes you wonder about his mental state. If he returned back to his boat and saw the BW notice. Was that enough to tip him over the edge. Lots of things to speculate about. I guess we will never know.
RIP
Mick
Posted by: Mick | Sunday, 21 August 2011 at 12:22 AM
Damn BW are getting tough with overstayers!
Posted by: maffi | Thursday, 18 August 2011 at 11:48 PM
Odd too I think is his clothes are not tattered, neither is the canvas and bimini top yet the boats exterior is wanting. My mind wonders to witness protection!
Posted by: Patsy | Thursday, 18 August 2011 at 10:35 PM
The thing to remember about these types of organizations, they have to follow spicific steps, no matter how ignorant they appear, before they can take action to remove abandoned vessels etc..
I'm saddened by the death of this man. Judging by his smile, he looks like a man who enjoyed an outdoor lifestyle. So sad to see a life end before it's time.
Posted by: Dan | Thursday, 18 August 2011 at 09:57 PM
very sad whatever it is...
Posted by: sazzy d | Thursday, 18 August 2011 at 02:33 PM
Bit creepy really.
Posted by: Fiona | Thursday, 18 August 2011 at 01:34 PM