Divers from all over the UK beat the storms to dive on a unique flying boat in the Milford Haven waterway - and came away with stunning memories of a fantastic wartime survivor.

The aircraft - which lies in 65 ft of water between Pembroke Dock and Neyland - is normally off limits to all divers apart from the Sunderland Dive Group which regularly monitors the site.

The group - working closely with the Pembroke Dock Sunderland Trust - organised a dive weekend on May 16/17 which was quickly subscribed, with a dozen divers coming to Pembrokeshire, many for the first time.

Despite the stormy conditions, most of the divers had at least one dive on the Sunderland, led by members of the group.

Stephen Thompson, chairman of the Sunderland Dive Group, said: "Very few divers were able to dive anywhere in the UK that weekend, but we made it. The challenging conditions led to the Saturday afternoon programme being suspended. However, most of those who could not get on the site dived it on Sunday morning when conditions were better.

"This was planned as a one-off event, but such was the interest that we shall have to seriously consider doing a repeat. The Sunderland Trust plans to recover the aircraft and display it at Pembroke Dock so, before long, it will disappear as a dive site.

"Images of the Sunderland site, taken by the visiting divers, are important additions to our archive," added Stephen.

Displays on the Sunderland Project, in a windswept tent at Hobbs Point, attracted considerable interest on the Saturday.