Three people were rescued after getting in trouble in water in Norfolk and Suffolk within hours of each other last night.

East of England Ambulance Service NHS Trust crews were called to help a person who had been pulled out of the sea off Lowestoft and two people found in Norfolk rivers.

The first rescue came at 7pm when ambulance crews were alerted to a man who appeared to be in trouble near South Pier in Lowestoft - not long after the opening day of the annual air show had ended.

He had been in the sea for about 10 minutes when the coastguard helped by the Royal Norfolk and Suffolk Yacht Club pulled him out.

The casualty was suffering from hypothermia but was conscious and breathing by the time paramedics took him to James Paget University Hospital in Gorleston.

Ambulance crews were then called at 10.45pm to a woman who had fallen into the river at Norwich between Wherry Road and King Street.

She was taken to the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital in a non life-threatening condition.

Less than an hour later at 11.35pm paramedics went to help a man, believed to be about 60, in the river at Bridges Walk, Thetford.

He was discovered face up and had sustained a head injury but was conscious and breathing normally and taken to Ipswich Hospital.

A spokeswoman for the ambulance service said: 'These incidents serve as further warnings that people should take extra care around open water, particularly during the evening.

'Traditionally such call outs increase during the summer and every year ambulance clinicians will be called to people who have not thought about their actions and endangered themselves.

'Several lives have already been lost this year across the UK and we don't want to see anyone else hurt or injured.'