Drogue

So, we're out on exercise training Daz and Barren how to use the Drogue.  All good fun and they're doing very well!

Secret weapon

So tonight was the final of the lifeboat darts competition.  We had three crew teams entered and Sam and Charlotte were the secret weapon of the C team! 

John F Gilmour
via HTC legend

Semi-submerged....

Here's a shot of last nights casualty taken from the ILB helmet camera.  Luckily for the occupants some of it seem to have remained afloat.

Except it wasn't!

So last nights shout wasn't quite what we expected. And that happens sometimes...the initial information from the Coastguard leads you to form an opinion about the shout which eventually turns out to be completely wrong. Last night was one of those occasions.

Anticipating a drifting kids inflatable, what the ILB crew actually found was a 12 foot inflatable with a 25 horse-power engine on the back. It had two punctured tubes and had almost entirely sunk with its crew in the water.

Before long it was in tow, crew in the ILB and heading back towards the beach at Ocean Bay.

Job done!

Lovely sunny evening...

No sooner had I put my fork down after Sunday diner than the pagers went off.  A typical Sunday evening shout, inflated dingy drifting out to sea...hopefully all well.

Sunset

The shout was a pretty straightforward tow of a yacht into Pooled harbour.  The only real excitement was the fact that our VHF broke!  Still, we've always got a back up and the lads coped just fine.  They arrived at Poole at tea time but sadly had no money for chips on.the quay...luckily the Poole DLA came up trumps with chocolate cake!

Back on the slip

It's always frustrating to miss a shout. I've been ill recently so missed a frustrating amount of action. Today  I returned to work then got home to find the boat out. And here they are just returning to the slip.  More later...

All the colours of the rainbow.

I meant to post this on Saturday but forgot.  This was the scene in the car park at the end if the day after the OK classic fishing competition.  I believe that Dave was there to receive the donation of 500 pounds (the combined entry fees rounded up by the nice folks at Johnson outdoors).

All in aid of a good cause...

So the kayak fishermen are in town for a fishing competition. Nearly 50 of them are out on the water and their entry fee of a tenner is being donated to the RNLI (the competition is being sponsored by Ocean Kayaks with a brand new kayak as the first prize. Good on you folks and have a good days fishing.

One of the best things about my job

is days like this!

Please mind the gap

It was another great exercise last night, in the wheelhouse Deasy and Dave grappled with the new Foruno plotter. Meanwhile, up on deck, Shi, Kev and myself anchored the boat and paddled ashore in the x boat for a bit of landing practise. We used the ILB as our method of escape and the video shows a skillful bit of boathandling from Andy Lyons assisted by useful 'spotting' from Becky.

I'm still not sure what martin and Steve spent the evening doing!

Good crowd tonight...

A good crowd of watchers tonight.

Lunch date.

Lunch today was a sociable event down at the Boathouse. We had a group of folk visiting us being shown a real life lifeboat station by various staff from HQ in Poole (and Divisional base South). It was our pleasure to show them around the station and talk to them a little about the work we do.

Two for the price of one...

I've just been informed by Dave that we have a shiny new chart plotter onboard (the top one in this rather poor photo. This replaces both the old Navstar plotter (which acted as our back-up GPS) and also our echo-sounder. I suspect that the idea behind this is to free up a bit of space for some other new piece of kit...watch this space.

Sunny bank holiday...

Despite it being a bank holiday, the weather has held up and Swanage is once again full to the gunnels.  Quiet so far on the lifeboating front, I've been out in the bay with the girls getting a bit of time on the water.

The Bends...

OK, so I wasn't there for the shouts today, so I might as well get someone who was to write this one up...introducing Becky:

The bank holiday brought its usual flurry of visitors to the town and shouts. Following a quiet Saturday the pagers sounded for the first time on Sunday at 13.45. The town was heaving and crew had to negotiate the crowds and queuing traffic to make it to the station in time. On arrival at the station it was no suprise that those first on site were those that had come on foot or bicycle!


On arrival we were informed that we had been stood down and the reported missing diver had in fact been found safe and well. However, a few minutes later we were told that the diver was suffering suspected bends and was therefore to be air-lifted to a decompression chamber from our lifeboat slipway. The local Coastguard were on hand to assist.


Today's DLA Dave Corben had his camera at hand and managed to get these snaps whilst typing up the service report, thank you Dave.

Less than 3 hours later the pagers were off again and the ILB was tasked to a 15 foot power boat with its anchor caught close into the rocks off Peveril Ledges. This combined with two flat batteries had rendered the boat and crew stranded at sea. The ILB was quickly on scene releasing the anchor and towing the casualty vessel back to land.

Thanks for providing dinner in exchange for writing a blog, the bribery worked!.......................

To the rescue...

So, it has been a busy  lifeboating day here in Swanage.  Not that I can tell you what's been happening.  I been busy driving to Somerset and back to rescue Liz who has just completed the second of two 120 mile bike rides. Unfortunately her lift abandoned her today hence a rather long drive for me.  I'll fill you in on the details of the shouts once I know more!

Kev

...was the lucky one who had a ride in the helicopter on Wednesday. It was a short ride but, judging by the grin on his face, a great deal of fun!

On the rather cramped afterdeck of the Mersey the winchman, Kev and Tom (who was tending the high-line) prepared for the lift.

It struck me that this new helicopter hovers much lover than the old Whiskey Bravo so the actual trip us was very short.

Once onboard it was a quick trip round the bay then back into formation on us ready for a lower back down.

Once again, the spray flew and made photographic conditions somewhat testing for Sam who was wielding my camera.

Suprise visit

I wasn't really expecting to take the boat out as Cox'n last night but somehow that's what happened. With little warning I found myself out there with a solid crew but not the most exciting plans of what to do. Imagine my delight then, when I heard over the radio one of our local Coastguard helicopters (Coastguard Helicopter 104, from Solent) calling to tell Deasy (navigator for the evening) that they were in the area and would like to spend some time exercising with us! Excellent...

So, out of the sunset they came, all red, white and exciting!

Their winchman, a nice bloke, came down on the winchwire and gave us a good briefing of what to expect.

All of us were surprised at the amount of spray which gets flung around by this new helicopter compared to the old 'Whiskey Bravo'.

This shot in particular shows vividly the cramped conditions on the afterdeck of a Mersey class lifeboat during helicopter operations.

Then after a few turns with the ILB they were off and heading for home...as were we. To arrive back for a quick washdown before a meeting about this year's lifeboat week.

Happy days!!

Missing person

Wednesday was a particularly busy day for the ILB who had a shout in the early afternoon. Apparently a person was threatening to jump off the cliffs near Old Harry. The ILB was paged and quickly launched. At the same time the Coastguard proceeded to search the top of the cliffs. Nothing was found so all units were returned to base or station and stood down. Crew were Gav (helm), Ant and Darren.