Police in the US are searching for a British man reported missing from a beach in California.

Kim Gordon, from Inverness, was reported missing on Monday from Monastery Beach in Carmel, by his 17-year-old son who said his dad had gone swimming.

Monterey County Sheriff's Office captain John Thornburg said the beach is "dangerous".

He said dive teams searched the water for two days but found no trace of the missing man.

US officials now believe he may still be alive.

Mr Thornburg told the Press Association: "The whole thing started on February 25, which was a Monday.

"We got a 911 call saying that he had gone swimming off one of our beaches and hadn't returned.

"This was 7.15pm, which was a little unusual to go swimming because it was dark.

"At that time we treated it as a missing person, as a swimmer in distress, so the fire department, the sheriff's office and state parks began searching.

"Monastery Beach is the area where he was reported to have gone. It's a very dangerous beach, getting out of the water is very difficult.

"For the next two days we put dive teams into the Pacific Ocean there to try and locate him and he wasn't."