A journalist who retired last year after working for the same weekly paper for most of his 46-year career and was once an extra on Baywatch has died at the age of 62.

David Green, left, started out at the West Briton straight from school in 1966 and remained there until his retirement last May, apart from a stint at the Western Morning News.

He covered the Camborne and Redruth area of Cornwall for most of his career but retired from a part-time reporting role at the West Briton to spend more time with his wife and children.

Tributes have been paid to David after his death last week, which came after he suffered complications from heart surgery.

Editor Richard Best said: “The news about David has really come as a terrible shock to us all. We were incredibly fond of him.

“He was a fantastic journalist of the old school, and we always valued his knowledge, great journalistic instincts and the humour he brought, as well as his good-natured and healthy cynicism. Our thoughts are with his family.”

David became a reporter at the age of 16 when his ambition to become a policeman had been thwarted on medical grounds and a friend told him about a trainee reporting role at the paper, which was then a broadsheet.

He appeared as an extra on popular TV programme Baywatch in the early 1990s when he travelled to California with the Cornish team for the World Surf Boat Championships.

Former colleague Colin Gregory said: “He had been suffering from complications from his most recent operation and there were serious doubts over whether he was fit to go.

“However, he set off and had the time of his life when the team was included among the extras with David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson in an episode of Baywatch.

“David was standing well in the background and his on-screen career lasted only a few seconds, but he was able to tell his colleagues when he returned back to his work on the Western Morning News: ‘At least I can say I’ve appeared on Baywatch’.”

Last year, David was awarded a plaque by Camborne Town Council in recognition of his services to the community as a reporter.

David was a member of Radnor Golf Club and a life member of Portreath Surf Life Saving Club, where he helped train youngsters for many years.

He leaves wife Ally, daughter Alex, 10, eight-year-old son Nicholas and a son and daughter from a previous marriage, Tristan and Tressa.