Sunshine and Lifeboat Rescue

As the hot weather continues, we enjoyed another long weekend aboard in Dartmouth. It was great to catch up with Duncan and Elisabeth, former custodians of 'Quahog' (another Vancouver 38P), now visiting in their new Southerly 110.

As the welcome sea breeze arrived on Sunday afternoon we set off for a sail, just as the Dart RNLI inshore lifeboat set off:

We had no inkling that, 15 minutes later, we'd find ourselves in the middle of a PanPan emergency call. We'd just cleared the castles at the entrance to the Dart and hoisted the mainsail when we heard a PanPan call on the VHF. This is one stage down from a full Mayday (which would indicate danger to life) but is still a serious event which requires other vessels to give immediate assistance if required. Strangely, the PanPan didn't get an answer from the coastguard (it transpired that the boat calling was very close to cliffs and only had a hand-held VHF radio) so Graham relayed the call to Falmouth Coastguard. Maunie then became the lead communications vessel for the emergency and we dropped our sail and motored over to the casualty.

We discovered that a 28ft sailing boat called Rocket was anchored off a cove that's much favoured in gentle conditions for its sandy beach that's only accessible from seaward. Unfortunately, a lovely day of swimming and fun in the sun had suddenly turned sour as the wind swung around to the SW and increased, making the anchorage very choppy and the boat drag its anchor towards the rock. it has to be said that this was clearly forecasted. The PanPan call had come from a small motorboat that had tried to help and her skipper reported that there were 15 people on Rocket (yes,15!), mostly teenagers, none of whom had life-jackets. We came close by and it seemed that all on board were just sitting there, apparently unaware of the trouble they were in; we suspected that a mix of sun exposure, seasickness and maybe the odd beer accounted for their lethargy.

We relayed the situation the the Coastguard and they tasked the Dart lifeboat to the scene; meanwhile one of the powerful the Dart Harbour RIBs attended and managed to tow Rocket from danger. This was the report from the lifeboat team after the event:

We were thankful that it all ended well, though the second boat rescued was, we think, a boat that had tried to assist in towing Rocket before the cavalry arrived, so it was a shame that they got in to difficulties despite their good efforts.

Anyway, it was good radio practice for us and we went on to have a lovely sail (and carry out a couple of Man Overboard exercises!),

Monday saw friends Karl, Mel and daughter Tori join us for the day - perfect conditions for a sail, a swim and an upriver exploration with lunch aboard.

The last time Karl was aboard Maunie was in Sydney Harbour!

A great day messing about on the water with friends; nothing beats it.