A RETIRED electrician died decades after being exposed to asbestos during his apprenticeship with South Eastern Electricity Board in the 1960s.

Brian Cramp, of Wellingtonia Gardens, Hordle, was regularly exposed to the toxic substance, including when it was used to tape sub-station cabling.

The father-of-four was diagnosed with mesothelioma in 2007, dying at the Oakhaven Hospice, in Lymington, on May 22 last year, aged 72.

Central and Southern Senior Coroner Grahame Short recorded a verdict of death due to industrial disease.