An adventure sports company and it’s director has been charged with six health and safety offences after a 21-year-old Worcestershire woman died in a river boarding tragedy.

Law graduate Emily Jordan, from Trimpley, drowned when she became trapped between rocks in the Kawarau River Gorge near Queenstown on New Zealand’s South Island in April.

She had been riding on a body board on fast-flowing rapids on an organised trip with her boyfriend, Jonny Armour, aged 23, when the accident happened.

Now, the company who organised the activity, Black Sheep Adventures Ltd, which trades as Mad Dog River Surfing, has appeared in court to face charges under the Health and Safety Employment Act 1992 .

In a hearing at New Zealand’s Queenstown District Court on Monday, Maritime New Zealand laid three charges against Black Sheep Adventures Ltd, and three charges against it’s director, Brad Alexander McLeod.

Each charge carried a maximum fine of $250,000 NZ or £90,000.

No plea was entered by either McLeod or on behalf of the company and the matter was remanded to February 9.

A spokesman for Maritime New Zealand said they were now working with the riverboarding and sledging industry to develop further safety standards and a code of practice - the need for which was identified during the investigation.

Emily’s father, Chris, who set up the Emily Jordan Foundation Trust with her mum Sarah, sister, Lucy, and brother, Alex, described the experience of visiting the place where she died as “harrowing”.

An inquest into Miss Jordan’s death was opened at the Black Country Coroner’s Office in West Bromwich in May, but coroner Robin Balmain adjourned the hearing until a full inquiry had been conducted in New Zealand.

Since Miss Jordan’s death the New Zealand Rafting Association have instructed all three Queenstown riverboarding companies to put its staff through a three-day safety course.