Dr Michael Mosley’s wife described the search for her missing husband as ‘the longest and most unbearable days for myself and my children’ as a body is found in the hunt for the Mail’s health guru.
Speaking before today’s discovery, Dr Clare Bailey noted that she had been waiting in agony for three days since her husband ‘left the beach to go for a walk’ on the charming Greek island of Symi before suddenly disappearing.
Now police looking for the missing TV doctor say they are investigating the discovery of a body close to an area known as The Abyss.
The body was found by staff at a nearby beach bar after being alerted by the mayor who had spotted something ‘unusual’ from the sea. The body was found at Agia Marina around 30 minutes walk from Pedi where he was last seen.
On Saturday a Greek fire brigade helicopter hovered overhead the spot where the body was found.
Dr Clare Bailey pictured with her husband Dr Michael Mosley who went missing on the Greek island of Symi. She described the search as ‘the longest and most unbearable days for myself and my children’ as a body is found in the hunt for the Mail’s health guru
Dr Mosley’s wife, Dr Clare Bailey (pictured together), a GP and also a columnist for the Mail, raised the alarm after her husband of nearly 40 years failed to return from a hike
Police believe Dr Mosley was seen on CCTV in the town of Pedi before making a wrong turn along a path heading north, on the island of Symi
Police arrived around 20 minutes after it had been discovered – around 100 metres from the shoreline.
A short while later a coastguard boat arrived and anchored just off the beach while a small tender with more officers to the scene.
Mayor Eleftherios Papakaloudoukas had accompanied media to Agia Marina but was on his way back to Pedi when he looked back and saw something unusual on the rocks.
He then called the beach restaurant and alerted staff who rushed over towards what he had seen with a group of British journalists who had remained behind.
Officials said the coroner had been informed and was travelling to Symi from Rhodes.
The waiter who found the body, Ilias Tsavaris, said: ‘The mayor had been here to give interviews to the media and then left on a boat to return to Pedi.
‘From the sea he saw something unusual and then he called the restaurant and asked them to check it out.
‘I was sent up there and as I turned the fence to go up I saw a glint from a watch and I then I saw the body at the same time.’
Earlier this year, Dr Mosley and Dr Bailey, 62, who have been married for 40 years, embarked on a joint theatre tour and previously worked together, among other things, on their famous 5:2 diet.
And it was she who raised the alarm when he failed to return home from a walk in blistering 36C (97F) heat by 7.30pm on Wednesday, which prompted local authorities to begin tracing his route overnight.
This is the picture of Dr Mosley posted with an appeal after he went missing while walking on holiday in Greece on Wednesday
The resort of Agia Marina, the location where a body was found
The waiter who found the body on the Greek island of Symi
Mayor of Syimi Eleftherios Papakalodouka who alerted the beach resort manager after he thought he saw something ‘unusual’ from the sea
Accounts suggest that after telling his wife he would walk to their accommodation rather than return with her and another couple in the boat, he seemed happy.
One witness to his stroll through Pedi, a fishing village, said he seemed to ‘cut a jaunty air’.
The English holidaymaker added: ‘I recognised him from the CCTV as someone who walked right past me.
‘What must have stuck in my mind was his umbrella which I later saw on the CCTV footage in the media. He was using it as a parasol as it was so unbearably hot on Wednesday. Yes, he was sauntering along, seemed fine.’
Dr Mosley, 67, was one of Britain’s best known medics, whose revolutionary diet advice made him beloved by millions of Daily Mail readers and TV viewers.
Police first filed a missing person report for Dr Mosley at 10.30am on Thursday and by midday each of the emergency services in Greece had joined the search on the tiny island of Symi.
The medic was seen leaving Saint Nicholas beach towards the town of Pedi, via a rocky path with steep sections.
CCTV footage showed him passing a café in the town, northeast of the holiday island of Symi.
The diet guru’s wife, Dr Clare Bailey (pictured together), a GP and also a columnist for the Mail, raised the alarm after her husband failed to return from a hike
Dr Mosley married Clare (pictured together) in 1987, after meeting in medical school, and they shared four children together
Dr Mosley with his wife Clare on their wedding day in 1987 nearly 40 years ago
The house in Symi which Dr Mosley and his wife were staying in
Firefighters take part in a search and rescue operation for Michael on the Greek island
Police believed Dr Mosley was likely hiking towards the town of Symi, due west of Pedi, but took a wrong turn and ended up on a ‘dangerous’ mountain path heading north.
The coastguard scoured the sea as the fire brigade searched the remote island’s forests and hills – with volunteers also assisting with the effort.
Dr Bailey’s anguish might have been assuaged, if only marginally, by the arrival on the island of the couple’s grown-up children.
At least two of the siblings joined the search, retracing part of the route their father is thought to have taken on a mountain.
In 2019, Dr Mosley wrote about a holiday with his wife in Cornwall when a dip in the freezing sea temporarily wiped his memory and he ended up in hospital.
‘I didn’t have any obvious signs of physical or facial weakness, nor was my speech slurred – both telltale signs of a TIA (transient ischaemic attack) and a stroke,’ he said. ‘I was lucid and the only thing that was obviously wrong with me was the fact that I had no memory of how I’d got there, or what had happened to me.
‘Puzzled, the junior doctor went off to fetch a more senior colleague. He did a further examination and gave me the good news that whatever was wrong with me, I had not had a stroke or epileptic attack.
‘Instead he said that I had almost certainly experienced something called transient global amnesia, and that it was brought on by cold-water swimming.
Temperatures over the last few days have been at times unbearable and there is a heat warning out from local authorities (pictured: rescue teams on the island)
Dr Michael Mosley, left, pictured with his wife Dr Clare Mosley at their Buckinghamshire home
A general view of Agia Marina, at the end of the treacherous route
A sign for St Nicholas beach. Dr Mosley set off from the beach on Wednesday for Pedi
Agia Marina near Pedi, where police think he may have been heading
‘He said it was like a migraine attack, and although my memory had been badly affected, he fully expected it to return to normal within 24 hours.’
He added: ‘It goes without saying, I’m glad that my amnesia wasn’t anything more serious. And, despite this experience, I’m not put off going for cold-water swims in the future.’
Finally, he added: ‘But I will make sure that when I do, I always have someone with me.’
