Renowned press photographer Alisdair Macdonald died last night of a suspected heart attack while he was on an assignment for London’s Evening Standard newspaper. He was 67.

Alisdair – who spent more than 20 years on the Daily Mirror – worked as a freelance for newspapers including the Daily Mail.

A spokesman for the Evening Standard picture desk told us that Alisdair died around 7pm while on an assignment to photograph collapsed buildings in Chelsea following a storm which struck London yesterday evening. Alisdair lived in nearby Pimlico. ‘As always he got up and went out to do it. He just loved taking pictures,’ the spokesman told us.

His career included coverage of many stories in Downing Street and we understand that photographers will today pay tribute to Alisdair by holding a minute’s silence after they have photographed Chancellor Gordon Brown emerging from Downing Street to deliver his Budget speech.

Last year Alisdair realised a 20-year dream when he charted the full moon rising over St Paul?s Cathedral.

He used a Nikon SLR and 80mm lens to create the shot using a tripod on London?s South Bank, exposing 10 times to show the moon as it moved to different positions in the early evening sky.