Run Out in the Dunbar Lifeboat
Today will go down as one of the highlights of 2015 for me after I was invited to join the Dunbar Lifeboat crew for a trip out around Bass Rock by Coxswain Gary Fairbairn and Station Asst Press Officer Gaz Crowe. I gladly accepted the invitation and headed down to the harbour at 11h30 this morning to meet everyone.
The trip began with a ride out to the mooring of the RNLB John Neville Taylor at Torness in the crew Land Rover before kitting up in a RNLI waterproof jacket and lifebelt, before being ferried across to the Trent Class lifeboat in the crew dingy.
While the skies were blue and the sun was shining, there was a strong wind driving a strong sea towards the East Lothian coast. As we headed past the breakwater at Torness out towards Bass Rock the swells began to hit the lifeboat and we made sure we were holding on to the guardrails for the crossing to The Bass.
While the Trent Class lifeboats have an impressive top speed of 25 knots, we made the crossing at around 80% of this maximum. However the John Neville Taylor soon had us under The Bass and the circling flocks of Gannets. In late August there are still tens of thousands of birds nest on Bass Rock, with the last of chicks that hatched earlier this summer almost ready to leave the nest.
We circled Bass Rock and then headed back towards Seacliffe and Tantallon Castle before heading East again back along Belhaven Bay and Dunbar.
The final stop was back at Torness and a quick swab of the decks before the John Neville Taylor was returned to its moorings and ready for action should the station receive a call.
My thanks go to Gary Fairbairn and the rest of the Dunbar Lifeboat crew for the opportunity to join them on the trip out. My already high regard for all the volunteers who crew the lifeboats around the shores of the UK has been enhanced even further by the experience today.
Dunbar has had a lifeboat station since 1808 and operates two lifeboats, the Off Shore Trent Class boat and a D Class Inshore boat named Jimmy Miff, covering this stretch of the North Sea and Firth of Forth. In the past 200 years members of the Dunbar Lifeboat have received 12 awards for gallantry.
The lifeboats are manned by volunteers and risk their lives to save others in peril out at sea.
92% of the Royal National Lifeboat Institute's income comes from donations and legacies and they depend on their dedicated volunteers and supporters to save lives at sea.
CLICK HERE for more information on the RNLI and HERE to find out more about supporting the charity.
For more information on the Dunbar Lifeboat visit the website HERE.
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