Young man dies after being buried alive on Australian beach before proposing to girlfriend

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A young man who was set to propose to his long-term girlfriend died after being buried alive under 2m of sand on an Australian beach.Josh Taylor's life support machine was tragically switched off on December 2, six days after he fell in a pit at Bribie Island's Woorim Beach.

Josh was all set to ask his girlfriend, Kaitlynd Odri, to marry him in the new year, having told a friend his romantic plans the day before his accident.Speaking at his funeral service on December 20, a family friend said: "The weather was perfect, they fished, they swam and they had a body-surfing competition.

That night they had dinner around the campfire and that's when Josh told his dad that he wanted to marry Kaitlynd in the new year."Josh and Kaitlyn didn't appear to be living together but are understood to have been dating for four years after meeting on the dating app Bumble, reports the Mirror.Hundreds of mourners are said to have gathered to farewell to Josh, an arborist from Brisbane, and were asked to wear board shorts, sun dresses and thongs for the occasion to reflect his relaxed, happy-go-lucky attitude to life.Detectives have now launched a criminal investigation into Mr Taylor's death, and it is said he fell into the hole when he stumbled and overbalanced as he got out of a chair, with his flailing arms bringing down its walls on top of him.He was buried headfirst, with his ankles only barely visible to rescuers, who tried to pull him out after their attempts to dig him out failed.

But the weight of the sand and the suction created as they yanked at him meant even the brute force of 15 men pulling on a rope around his feet was unable to dislodge him.The Daily Mail reported that an off-duty paramedic advised the rescue party to try