THE BODY OF missing pensioner Thomas Kennedy will be returned to his family in Dublin this week.

His remains were discovered in Blackpool shortly after he went missing last summer but they were not identified until this week.

Lancashire Constabulary confirmed that his body was found near Starrgate in Blackpool in August.

“This week they have been confirmed as that of Thomas Kennedy, 81, who went missing from his home in Dublin last year,” a statement to TheJournal.ie continued.

His body was identified through DNA testing and is due back in Ireland shortly.

The news of Mr Kennedy’s death was released on a Facebook page dedicated to the search for the missing 81-year-old Finglas man and confirmed by gardaí.

His family have thanked people “all over the country involved in the effort to bring him home”.

In a statement, gardaí thanked the public for help in the search.

“The body of Thomas Kennedy has been located. Gardaí wish to thank the public and the media for all their assistance in this matter. No further action is required,” the statement said.

The elderly man was last seen putting out the bins at his home in the Virginia Park area of Finglas, north Dublin, on 29 July 2014. When his grandson came home later that evening, he raised the alarm.

His disappearance sparked a widespread search by volunteers, many of which spared their own time despite having little or no connection to Thomas, his family noted at the time.

The family’s appeal was renewed at Christmastime. “There’s always a slight hope that he’ll come back to us,” his son Vincent said in a video appeal.

“I’ll never give up. The weirdest thing about it is that there’s no CCTV footage of him whatsoever. If, God forbid, he is dead, we could grieve. It’s closure. The hardest part is not knowing where he is.”

Additional reporting by Christine Bohan

More: ‘I’ll never give up searching for my father, there’s always some hope’

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