WHAT started as a routine outing for members of a Wirral diving club turned into a day to remember after they found a loaded gun at the bottom of the River Dee.

Wirral Sub-Aqua Club divers were surprised to find the pistol wrapped in a plastic bag during their dive at Eccleston Ferry, in Chester, on Saturday, while others came across a submerged car.

Their discovery led to police divers mounting an underwater search that same evening.

Jennifer Scholey, who was dive  manager for the day, told the Globe: “It’s not the sort of thing we expected to find, and we haven't really found anything of importance before other than collectable old bottles.

“Both these items are unusual sights for divers.  They had been expecting to find broken pottery, old bottles, the occasional flatfish and an abundance of sand and gravel.  This dive had turned into a rather exciting morning out.”

Eleven club members were enjoying the early season dive, having been stopped from diving the Welsh coast by strong wings.

The first pair to finish their dive, Alan Cohen and Ian Jackson, brought out the gun, which was wrapped in a plastic carrier bag and loaded. 

The police were contacted immediately.

Alan, from Port Sunlight said: "Normally you ignore plastic bags but there wasn't much around so I decided to investigate. I opened it up and showed Ian and he gave me the gun sign. We surfaced and had a look at it and sure enough it was what we thought."

Alan said the gun was a Browning 9mm.

Another buddy pair, Clare Sherliker and Chris Gregory, found the car, which had no doors or bonnet but had seats and the windscreen was unbroken.

The club – which meets and trains at Neston Recreation Centre pool each Thursday at 8.30pm – hadn’t dived in the Dee for a number of years.

The gun was handed in to Blacon Police Station on Saturday.

A spokesman for Cheshire Police said the car – understood to be a Mini – is believed to have been submerged for a long time and is not connected to the gun, which was later found to be a replica firearm and was made safe.