A COLLEGE principal has suspended all trips following the death of a 17-year-old pupil on a walking trip to Cornwall.

Blackburn College principal Ian Clinton today said educational trips would now need his personal consent and he would personally review all plans.

The move is an extra precautionary step to ensure that no students are put at risk following the tragic death of Asif Bharucha, of Shear Brow, Blackburn, on Tuesday.

Fellow students and three tutors watched in horror as the student fell to his death from a cliff-top path near Lizard Point after being frightened by a barking dog. They were due to return home last night having cut the trip short.

Police in Devon and Cornwall are now appealing for the black dog's owner - who spoke to the group after the accident - to come forward.

The walking trip by business studies students had been successfully completed by other groups from the college, which had carried out a risk assessment of the route.

Mr Clinton said: "All other trips have been suspended. No trip is allowed to go ahead without my personal consent. It is a question of double checking everything and giving it my personal approval.

"Nothing in the near future should be affected. I have just received a request for a trip in September which will be looked in to."

A Health and Safety Executive inquiry is already on-going in conjunction with police into the accident.

A police spokesman said: "The man with the dog stopped and talked to some of the students but then carried on walking. We do want to speak to him."