Monday 7 May 2007

Shout - ILB nearly rescues a child's inflatable!

Not all lifeboat shouts are heroic. Indeed, not all lifeboat shouts come to anything. However, something can certainly be learned from most of them. Take Saturday afternoons offering; bright sunny afternoon and a stronger than predicted off-shore breeze. Emphatically not the right time to be messing about in an inflatable toy.

Portland Coastguard received a '999' call from a member of the public saying that 2 children were being blown out to sea in a small inflatable dinghy, their mother was swimming out to their aid but they weren't sure if she would be able to catch them. The lifeboat crew were paged and the ILB was quickly in the water and on scene two minutes later. Fortunately the situation had resolved itself and the children had just made it back to the beach when the lifeboat arrived. Once it was established that everyone was accounted for and no further assistance was required the ILB was released to return to station.

Thankfully many 'incidents' in Swanage are resolved like this, people either sort themselves out or a member of the public lends assistance........just how it should be.

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