Former EastEnders star Paul Nicholls rescued from Thailand waterfall

Actor Paul Nicholls has been rescued after being trapped at the bottom of a waterfall in Thailand for three days.

The former EastEnders star was found last Thursday by a villager who walked past his abandoned motorcycle in a remote jungle waterfall in the island of Koh Samui.

The 38-year-old star had been there for three days, after breaking his leg falling from the top of the waterfall.

"I am lucky to be alive. I had a phone with me but I fell from such a height into the water it was unretrievable," he told The Sun newspaper.

"It took such a long time to find me. It's an understatement to say it wasn't a great situation.

"It wasn't that I was lost. The problem was I couldn't move to get out of there."

Medics from the rescue service said Nicholls also suffered from hypothermia and the actor believes he is "missing a kneecap" which needs "complete reconstruction".

According to the report, police managed to trace the rental bike back to Nicholls' real name, Gerrard Paul Greenhalgh.

The actor was famous for portraying Joe Wicks in EastEnders in the 1990s and also appeared in Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason, some of which was shot in Thailand, in 2004.

He has just finished filming the Channel 4 series Ackley Bridge.

Nicholls is said to be recovering well and will be flown back to the UK next week.