Lifeboat Responds to Mayday Call
Hastings RNLI volunteer lifeboat crew towed a sailor safely into harbour after responding to his Mayday call last Thursday evening (26 June).
Hastings all weather lifeboat Richard and Caroline Colton on an earlier launch
The lifeboat launched immediately and soon located the vessel, which was approximately four miles west of Hastings and drifting eastwards. Once on the scene, the lifeboat crew assessed the casualty and, with force 5 winds and darkness approaching, the crew had a conversation with the yacht’s skipper to establish his welfare. They agreed that the best course of action was to tow the yacht to the nearest harbour, Eastbourne’s Sovereign Harbour, for safety and repairs.
Arriving in the entrance to the harbour, the tow was shortened, and the lifeboat took the vessel into the marina via the lock.
Paul McCleery, Hastings Lifeboat’s full-time coxswain, commented, “It’s never nice being at sea sailing single-handed when the weather is deteriorating, daylight is fading, and you are a long way from home. When a situation of distress then arises which means you can’t continue, it is fairly stressful–so I am pleased that we were able to locate and assist the casualty and get them into the safety of Eastbourne harbour.’
The lifeboat returned to Hastings lifeboat station at 1am on Friday morning, and was refuelled and made ready for its next service. But the night had been one of the busiest the Hastings RNLI workforce has had for a very long time. Volunteers received three ‘shouts’ in the space of less than two hours–with two calls for the inshore lifeboat in addition to the Mayday call for the yacht. The crews of both lifeboats and the shore and support crews all worked extremely hard, showing great teamwork.
The Hastings lifeboat crew had answered a similar emergency call just four days earlier, on the evening of Sunday 22 June, when a 24-foot yacht came into difficulty off Hastings pier and also had to be towed to the safety of Sovereign Harbour.
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