A UNIVERSITY student was killed at the weekend after he fell around 30ft from the ruins of St Andrews Castle.

The body of the first-year history student at St Andrews University was discovered by two foreign tourists who were visiting the castle on Saturday. The teenager, whose name is being withheld until relatives have been informed, is from the Strathclyde area.

Police were joined by paramedics at the scene and a local doctor pronounced the man dead.

The body was discovered on a ledge which juts out towards cliffs and the sea, and the 19-year-old is thought to have fallen while trying to climb the castle ruins, a challenge tried in the past by daredevil students at Scotland's oldest university. A mountain rescue team from the nearby RAF base at Leuchars was brought in to lift the body off the ledge.

Police said there were no suspicious circumstances and that a report would be submitted to the procurator-fiscal.

It is the fourth tragedy to strike the St Andrews student community in the past year. In February a 19-year-old Edinburgh University student visiting friends in St Andrews died in hospital several days after he fell 40ft from cliffs on to rocks on the sea front around a mile from the latest incident.

In September, another 19-year-old St Andrews student died after collapsing while playing football only eight days after an 18-year-old plunged 100ft to his death while climbing in Glen Clova.