DIVER Blake Aldridge took time out from jumping off cliffs to leap from a Second World War fort in the Thames Estuary.

An Olympic finalist in 2008 alongside Tom Daley, Aldridge joined fellow British diver Gary Hunt for a terrifying 18m plunge from one of the Maunsell Forts 10 miles off the north Kent coast.

The remarkable structures were built in 1942 to help defend the UK during the war but after being decommissioned in the 1950s, they are unused today after a spell broadcasting 1960s pirate radio including the famous Radio Caroline.

Croydon's Aldridge made a splash in the estuary last Sunday and despite a rickety platform affecting their early dives, he and Hunt produced some better ones from a more solid jump-off point and managed to emerge unscathed.  

At a competition in Boston last month Aldridge completed the world's most difficult dive: a back arm stand, back two-and-a-half somersault with four twists.

He said competing in front of a UK crowd in Saturday's Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series event in Pembrokeshire, Wales, will be "very special".

Aldridge said: "I'll be doing my new dive, which is the world's hardest dive as well. 

"I'm hoping that the leg injury I sustained in France will have improved enough for me to get on to the podium for the first time this year."