Rescuers have found the body of a Guardia Civil coast guard officer who went missing at around 9pm on Saturday night after falling overboard from a Zodiaz inflatable dinghy as he and a colleague were searching off Galicia's El Ferrol coast for a missing person.

The officer, who was equipped with a GPS mobile tracking device that seemingly failed to activate, was found shortly after the search and rescue mission resumed at first light yesterday morning.

The missing officer, whose identtity has not been confirmed, had been searching for a corpse sighted earlier on Saturday by the crew of a local fishing vessel. It seems that he was swept overboard by a freak wave as he and his colleague were preparing to suspend their search as a result of poor visibility.