London - The man who saved Virgin boss Richard Branson's life last year when his balloon failed on a round-the-world attempt was seriously injured yesterday when his parachute failed to open properly in a 13,000 ft sky dive.
Mr Alex Ritchie (52) suffered multiple injuries in the accident in Morocco. He had been engineer on Branson's current round-the-world attempt. Mr Branson said last night he was "very shocked" at the news and a decision on whether to go ahead with the balloon bid would be taken today.