Oxford student Kai Dawson stood on the jib of a crane more than 80ft from the ground, with his arms outstretched like a scene from the blockbuster movie, Titanic.

But the 21-year-old's body was found later in the back garden of a house in east Oxford after he apparently lost his balance and plunged to his death, an inquest heard yesterday. After the tragedy on February 12, police inquiries revealed that Mr Dawson, a popular engineering student at St Edmund Hall, had spent the evening drinking with friends, but had left The Turl pub alone at closing time.

Half an hour later, people waiting for a taxi outside The Star pub off Cowley Road saw a long-haired man making noises on top of the crane. Pub manager Anthony Partridge told Oxford coroner Nicholas Gardiner: "The person was standing on the tip end of the boom, bolt upright and with his arms outstretched DiCaprio-Winslet sort of thing.

"He wasn't waving around and looked quite confident not scared."

Mr Partridge asked a friend to call the police.

Officers could not see anyone on the crane, and found the fenced building site locked and secure. Pc Robin Shane said: "We stayed to look at the crane, because we get quite a few of these calls and didn't know if it was genuine or not."

Mr Dawson's body was found at 2.30pm the next day.

His shoes were missing and he appeared to have been dead for some hours.

Post-mortem tests revealed he had a blood alcohol level twice the legal drink-drive limit. Dr David Davies, consultant pathologist at the John Radcliffe Hospital, said any one of several major internal injuries, which were consistent with a fall of around 75ft, would have been enough to have caused death.

Recording a verdict of accidental death, the coroner said that although it remained a matter of supposition, he believed Mr Dawson had taken it into his head to get in to the building site and make his way up the tower and on to the jib. Mr Gardiner added: "No-one saw him fall, but I am quite satisfied he did so."