Reported efforts by King to contact Sir Ranulph Fiennes were blocked, Press Association reports

The Press Association reports that King Charles attempted to contact his long-time friend, adventurer Sir Ranulph Fiennes, after concerns were raised about Fiennes’s declining health and isolation. The report says fellow explorer Anton Bowring wrote to the King’s principal private secretary in February last year, describing Fiennes as being “in a very poor state” and saying that friends were worried. The Telegraph had previously revealed the King’s concern, according to the supplied report.

According to the account, the King’s then-equerry later told Bowring that Charles wanted to write to Fiennes, his wife Louise Millington-Cotes and their daughter, and asked for Millington-Cotes’s telephone number. The report says Millington-Cotes then sent angry text messages to Bowring after Buckingham Palace received her details. These claims are attributed to the Press Association’s reporting and are not independently established in the supplied evidence.

The story has prompted public comments from several of Fiennes’s well-known friends, including Bear Grylls, Ben Fogle, Joanna Lumley, John Simpson and Monty Don. The report says there have been calls for investigations by police and the Office of the Public Guardian. It also states that Fiennes, who is 82, has not been seen in public for two years and may have been moved between care homes in Wales and Cheshire under an assumed identity. His current whereabouts are described as unknown.

Interpretation: the supplied evidence indicates growing concern among Fiennes’s associates about his welfare and access to him. It does not establish why contact was reportedly blocked, whether any wrongdoing occurred, or the present condition or location of Fiennes.