British Paralympian found alive and well after going missing in Las Vegas

A British paralympian who has been missing in Las Vegas for over a week has been found safe.

Sam Ruddock, a track cyclist from Rugby, Warwickshire, travelled to the United States on 13 April to watch the WWE’s WrestleMania event. Loved ones began to worry after they last heard from him on 16 April.

He was reportedly staying at a hostel called the Bungalows in Las Vegas while he was hoping to see WrestleMania. He checked in on the 14th and was supposed to check out on the 15th, but had not checked out and had left his belongings.

Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department told The Independent that they received a missing person report for Mr Ruddock on 24 April and have managed to find him safe.

A spokesperson said: “A missing person report was filed on April 24, 2025. Through the course of the investigation, the individual has been located safe.”

Mr Ruddock’s mother, Fran Ruddock, and his close friend Lucy Hatton, a former athlete who lived with him in 2017, had appealed for help in finding him after he hadn’t been heard from since 16 April. Mr Ruddock, who lives with cerebral palsy, has a son who is two and a half years old.

Ms Hatton took to social media to express her joy over the news her friend was alive and safe. She told followers on social media: “Let’s get that boy home.”

She later told The Independent: “Sam is alive and well. Currently [we’re] working with authorities to get him home safely.

She added that “family and friends are so grateful to everyone for their love and support to help get Sam home” and confirmed “he’s physically okay”.

When Mr Ruddock first went missing, Ms Hatton said: “something just wasn’t right because Sam was someone who was so overwhelming on social media”.

“He’s the type of person who wants to share his passions and he loves sport”, she added, calling him a “tremendous human being.”

Beyond Diddly Squat: The Cotswolds farm shops that are worth the trip

I’ve never been one for a queue. I hate waiting in line for a table at a restaurant. I’ve never queued up at a bookshop at midnight ahead of the latest release. And I have never bothered with the 7am wake-up call for the January sales on Boxing Day.

And yet, on a Wednesday in mid-March, I’m queuing to get into a small shed that belongs to TV presenter and motoring-journalist-turned-farmer, Jeremy Clarkson. This is Diddly Squat Farm Shop, as seen in the hit Amazon Prime TV show, Clarkson’s Farm, and it’s chaotic even when the weekend crowds have gone home.

The reward at the end of the line is somewhat underwhelming. I shuffle in among a gaggle of tourists, sandwiched between a selfie stick and a GoPro on a tripod, and can barely see the produce through the crowds. There’s local honey on offer for £12, jam for just short of a fiver, and candles that purport to smell like Clarkson’s genitals. The whole experience is unappealing and, frankly, tacky. And yet Diddly Squat has brought in thousands of visitors to the Cotswolds over the last five years since it opened in 2020.

But this isn’t the only farm in this National Landscape. This bucolic region is packed with arable fields and grazing pasture where you’ll find lambs and sheep roaming throughout summer. And the farmers responsible, who were here long before Clarkson’s crew arrived, have been producing and selling their wares in their own farm shops for decades.

Read more: Six most beautiful Cotswold towns and villages you must visit

You don’t have to go far from Clarkson’s digs to find them. Just a 10-minute drive south of Diddly Squat lies the greatly underrated FarmED, a 107-acre regenerative agriculture experiment and education centre headed by Ian and Celene Wilkinson. Regenerative farming has found its way into mainstream media and conversation thanks to Clarkson’s Farm, but this pair have been doing it for decades on the farms they’ve managed. For visitors, FarmED is a fascinating place to see it in action on self-guided tours, and sample the delicious vegetables that grow in their nutrient-rich soil at the onsite cafe. Down the road, stop in at the tiny but enticing Bruern Farm Shop and Cafe for pasture-fed beef, local beers and handicrafts and gifts made by Cotswolds-based artisans.

And then you’ve got Daylesford – a farm shop on steroids with price tags to match. This organic farm and dairy is a vast place of 2,200 acres and a gargantuan operation, with several hundred dairy and beef cows of varying breeds, Merino sheep for wool and Kerry Hill and Lleyn sheep for lamb. They raise hundreds of truly free-range chickens for eggs, grow a market garden with kale, lettuce, leeks and more, and even have a flower garden for fresh-cut flowers for the table.

The shop itself is more like an upper-class supermarket than a traditional farm shop. Their magnificent cheese room is the undisputed highlight, where the farm’s own creamery, located just a few metres away behind the shop, stores their tangy cheddar, buttery Baywell and mellow Double Gloucester. There’s a deli counter where much of the kitchen garden produce is put to use in salads, and a butcher where you can buy their lamb sausages or 35-day dry-aged steaks from the local herd.

It might all seem a little steep in price, but book a stay at one of their pubs with rooms and you’ll be able to tour the farm to see just how much work goes into creating each bit of produce. And definitely don’t leave without a meal in The Trough, where Michelin has awarded the chefs with its coveted Green Star for sustainability and quality cooking.

Read more: The best spa hotels in the Cotswolds for thermal waters and rejuvenating treatments

A far more understated affair is 13-miles south from here at Upton Smokery, just outside Burford on the A40 to Cheltenham. While it’s not affiliated with any particular farm locally, this cavernous barn stocks local honey, eggs and cheeses alongside sumptuous produce from abroad – think voluptuous Spanish artichokes and fragrant Italian lemons – while at weekends the vast barbecues at the far end of the shop are fired up for cooking brisket, chicken, ribs and more, all smoked here on site, for diners in the know. It’s a little-known spot for finding exciting food, and I can almost guarantee you won’t have to queue to get in the door.

Of course, Clarkson isn’t the only celebrity in the Cotswolds with their hand in farming, either. Countryfile’s Adam Henson has his own family farm just outside of Cheltenham. I strike out from Diddly Squat to visit his Cotswold Farm Park, where you can meet rare breed sheep and cattle, and then sample some of them in the onsite Ox Shed shop and cafe. I take in the wildlife walk with the dog and spot a few goats poking their heads out from inside a barn, but I can’t stick around for long, as I’ve got an important appointment with a world-famous sausage roll.

A five-minute drive takes me to the almost unbearably quaint village of Guiting Power, where The Cotswold Guy farm shop, deli and cafe draws visitors from as far as the USA. Former Auberge du Soleil chef Chris Davey tells me how his sausage rolls shot to fame after David Beckham shared on Instagram that they are the best he’s ever eaten. Baked daily in his shop, which is packed with other local produce and home-cooked meals by Davey which you can take home to reheat – his ethos is “I gather, you cook” – they’re a regular sellout. I opt for a sausagemeat bap with eggs, bacon-dusted tater tots and a fresh grapefruit juice, which I devour in the sun-kissed garden behind the cafe, smug in the knowledge that while the hordes are piling into the Diddly Squat car park, I’ll likely have this place to myself for the hour.

Read more: Seven of the best walks in the Cotswolds and where to stay

How online schools can help children form friendships as they learn

When thinking about the best education for your child, it’s naturally not just academic success that comes to mind. A good quality school experience is made up of many parts and one key element is the socialising opportunities that school can provide. Socialisation is crucial for building social skills, growing emotional intelligence and helping children form their own individual identity, as well as giving them an additional incentive to attend a place where they have fun and feel part of a community.

While it might be assumed that the social options are reduced when children attend online school, this is not the case. In fact, there are a number of advantages in terms of the structures, support and diverse social opportunities offered to children who join online schools.

Online schools give students the opportunity to form connections with a much more diverse community of students. The online model allows schools to welcome young people from around the world and this gives pupils a chance to make friends with students from differing backgrounds and cultures. Furthermore, this means they can meet more like-minded individuals and form stronger bonds and more meaningful friendships. This access to such a big and vibrant community also ensures that students can really find ‘their people’ and avoids situations where students are stuck in small circles or forced to engage with classmates that don’t share the same interests or passions.

This is something that Grace, who is now in year 13, has experienced since moving to online school. At her previous school, she was struggling with socialisation and felt that she didn’t really have a self-identity. At an online school, she has found she can be more herself. “A lot of people think that online school is about being alone, but I’ve found that without the physical element, I can express myself better,” Grace explains.  Subsequently, the majority of her closest friends are from her online school and many she has met offline too. “I feel like I’ve met my people,” she says.

Isabella, who is in year 10, has also found that her experience of socialising at an online school has suited her much more than previous bricks and mortar schools. With her father’s job meaning the family moves country every three years, she has always previously struggled forming new friendships at the schools she joins. “I’m always the ‘new’ student, and it’s tough,” she says. After experiences with bullying, she found that online school is an environment she can thrive in. “You don’t have to turn on your camera or use your microphones if you’re not feeling comfortable. I’m not really a ‘social’ person, but I have made some friends here because we have these breakout rooms where we can talk to each other,” she adds.

While young people might not be meeting their fellow students physically every day, online schools put in place extensive measures to ensure that socialising is available for those who want to. This can be seen clearly at King’s InterHigh, the UK’s leading global online school which welcomes children aged 7 to 19 from across the world. Here, students join a warm and welcoming community with a huge range of opportunities for socialising. There’s dozens of clubs and societies for students across all year groups, representing a vast range of interests from chess to technology, sculpture to debate. Throughout the yearly student calendar, there are a number of events, showcases, and competitions of all kinds that provide a chance to socialise in different settings. Some happen internally, like the King’s InterHigh Arts Festival, while others allow students to interact with peers from outside their school when attending events like the International Robotics Competition.

Assemblies bring students together on a weekly basis and give them the chance to celebrate each other’s achievements, hear from their Student Council representatives, and find out what’s coming up at school. Each student is also assigned to one of the school’s eight houses and these smaller, tight-knit communities bring students a sense of belonging and camaraderie. Additionally, inter-house competitions are a fun and friendly way for students to engage and bond.

Although much socialising can come as a result of activities organised by the school, students at King’s InterHigh who are aged over 13 can continue building these relationships in a more informal setting thanks to the in-house, monitored, social media platform. Restricted solely to school students, the platform is safe, secure, and monitored to ensure a positive socialising environment for all those who choose to use it.

Online schools don’t just offer opportunities to socialise online but also offer ample opportunities to cement these connections in offline settings. At King’s InterHigh, there are global meet-ups throughout the year which bring together families allowing both children and parents and guardians to connect in real life. Regular educational school trips, from Geography excursions to science practical exams at other Inspired schools (the group of premium schools of which King’s InterHigh is part of) also allow children to socialise and have fun together in different settings.

Meanwhile, the annual summer camps, themed around a variety of interests and passions, including adventure sports, fashion, football, and tennis, are open to students across all Inspired schools and are held at spectacular Inspired campuses worldwide. Furthermore, the Inspired Global Exchange Programme offers a range of school exchange opportunities, lasting from one week to a full academic year.

Choosing where to educate your children is a big decision for any parent or guardian that involves many factors. However, when it comes to the social benefits, for the right child, online schools offer something truly transformative. To find out more about King’s InterHigh and whether it might be the right learning choice for your family, visit King’s InterHigh