Officials at the Pompeii archaeological site have announced a dramatic new discovery: the skeleton of a man crushed by an enormous stone while trying to flee the explosion of Mount Vesuvius in 79AD.

Pompeii officials released a photograph showing the skeleton protruding from beneath a large block of stone that may have been part of a door frame that had been “violently thrown by the volcanic cloud”.

The victim, who was over 30, had his thorax crushed. Archaeologists have not found the victim’s head.