HANNAH Timing's father has admitted he has mixed emotions over the discovery of a body almost nine years after she died in a helicopter crash.
Police in New Zealand are conducting DNA tests on a body believed to be Hannah after wreckage of the Hughes 500 aircraft was spotted by a local helicopter pilot in Fiordland, a remote part of the country on the South Island.
Hannah, from Toddington, was just 28 when she and her Kiwi boyfriend Campbell Montgomerie, 27, who was piloting their helicopter, died in a crash on January 3, 2004.
The wreckage had never been found, despite the authorities scouring the area, but the Hughes 500 was finally spotted in rugged terrain at the edge of the original search area on Thursday.
Hannah's father, Phil, said: "In some ways it's a sort of relief. It drags it all up and you have to go through it all again. It's not nice. It's not anything that you get over."
Police also found a body believed to be Campbell in the wreckage, and they are now hoping to formally identify him and Hannah by using DNA samples.
Inspector Olaf Jensen, who is leading the police investigation, said it could take around two weeks to identify the bodies.
He added: "The coroner will make a decision about the releasing of the bodies."
Police believe Hannah and Campbell would have died instantly in the impact of the crash.
Hannah, who was a pupil at Pate's Grammar School and Winchcombe Primary School, planned to take over her father's furniture business in Toddington, Upholstery Techniques, when she returned from her six-month backpacking trip.
A bench designed by Hannah's sister Layla is on the green near St Andrew Church in Toddington. More than 100 people attended a memorial for Hannah in the village in 2004.
