Dylan Wagemans
A BRITISH woman who lived in Gibraltar has officially become the oldest person in the world at the age of 115, according to the Guinness World Records.
Ethel Caterham, who currently lives in a care home in Surrey, has taken the title at 115 years and 253 days.
She was born in Hampshire on August 21, 1909 as the youngest of eight children.
She lived in Gibraltar for many years, since her British Army Major-husband was stationed at the Rock.
Mrs Caterham is the oldest person in the world, after the death on 30 April of the previous record holder, Inah Canabarro Lucas, who was a 116-year-old nun from Brazil.
Before the Brazilian, the world-record holder was a Catalan woman, who died at the age of 117 last August.
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Mrs Caterham sets multiple records – including being the last living person to be born in 1909.
She was also among the oldest people to have contracted COVID, and survive.
She has outlived her husband Norman, who died in 1976, and both her children Gem and Anne, who died after the millennium.
Mrs Caterham remains in good health and enjoys sitting in the garden at her care home, which has been named Ethel’s Garden in her honour.
