A North-East university student plunged 14 floors to his death when he stepped through open lift doors without realising the lift was not there.

Keen sportsman Toby Mann, 18, was on a gap-year trip to Argentina in March. A friend heard him crying for help and desperately tried to save him after the fall but Toby died the next day from multiple injuries with internal and external bleeding.

An inquest held in Bournemouth was told Mr Mann, whose parents live on a farm in Bowerchalke, near Salisbury, Wiltshire, was in Buenos Aires with his friend Timothy Bradley.

He intended to return to Britain where he was a student at Newcastle University.

He hoped to join the Army and then become a farmer.

Mr Payne was told the two friends had spent Saturday, March 13, shopping, swimming and sailing before returning to an apartment belonging to a friend.

They left the 14th floor apartment at about 10.30pm to go out for dinner. In a statement to the inquest Mr Bradley said he was locking the door of the apartment as his friend headed for the lift.

When he turned around, he could not see his friend but realised the lift door was open and the lift shaft was dark.

Mr Mann was taken to hospital, where he died the following afternoon.

Checks revealed faults with the lift doors which allowed them to open on the 7th, 13th and 14th floors despite the lift not being there.