Narrowboat home fired

THE NARROWBOAT belonging to liveaboard Graham Bennett was fired leaving him without a home.

It was on the 9th of January that he returned to his boat to see it just a burnt-out shell, and sunk, Janet Friend reports.

He discovered that it had been destroyed by fire two days previously and was being investigated as arson by the Cleveland Police.

The boat, that was moored near the Tees Barrage in Stockton-on-Tees, he told was his retirement and his future, and now he has lost both, together with all his possessions.

Had been ransacked

Graham Bennett returned to his boat to find his home wrecked, just days after it had been ransacked, giving the police the feeling it was arson.

He had purchased the narrowboat Phoenix as his retirement home that was in a sorry state, then spent years working on it even rebuilding its engine and some steel work to make it fit to occupy, but now it has all gone, and he is worried about getting it removed and scrapped as it is beyond all the work that would be needed for him to refit.