After spotting a life raft drifting off the coast, a concerned member of the public did the right thing by calling 999 and asking for the coastguard.
The life raft in question was a large 24-man inflatable life raft that would normally only ever be deployed if, for example, a large vessel had cause to abandon ship.
The Coastguard paged the volunteer lifeboat crew based at Penlee in order to locate the drifting life raft in case it was full
Thankfully, it turned out to be a false alarm after patrol vessel HMS Mersey had reported to the Coastguard that one of its life rafts was missing.
The life raft was retrieved by the volunteer crew and is in the process of being collected by the Royal Navy.
Had the life raft not of been found, then chances are that it could have been spotted by merchant shipping further off the coast as it floated out to see which may have led to a further mobilisation of search and rescue personnel.
A post on the Penlee Lifeboat Facebook page said:
‘At 2.15pm this afternoon (8th Feb) the all-weather lifeboat ‘Ivan Ellen’ and her volunteer crew launched on service from Newlyn.
‘A third party report had been received from a member of the public, who was walking on the coast path near
‘Falmouth Coastguard Operations Centre tasked the lifeboat to launch immediately and conduct a search of the area in question.
‘The Ivan Ellen quickly located a 24 man fully equipped life raft 2.5 nautical miles SE of Newlyn. It was full of water which made recovery quite difficult.
‘After several
‘The life raft was identified as coming from HMS Mersey. They had previously reported its loss to the Falmouth Coastguard Operations Centre.
‘HMS Mersey is the youngest of the original batch of
‘The life raft will be collected by the Royal Navy early next week.
Weather – Stormy with squally showers, SW Force 7-8, rough sea.
‘Crew – Coxswain Patch Harvey, Mechanic Tony Rendle, Marcel Le Bretton, Jack Shannon, Andrew Stevens, Amy Smith & Will Treneer.’
The only question is whether or not a ‘cake fine’ applies to the crew of HMS Mersey?
If ever you spot what you believe to be a life raft drifting on the sea, then always call 999 and ask for the coastguard as the life raft could contain individuals who are in need of help.
Thankfully, this sighting proved to be a false alarm and the life raft was quickly located by the Penlee Lifeboat volunteer crew.
If you have a story, video or one-off blog that you would like to share with us, then you can contact our team of former emergency services & armed forces personnel either through our Facebook page, via Twitter ( @ES_News_ ) or you can contact us via email: contact@emergency-services.news
If you run or manage a ‘job’ social media account and you would like us to share one of your stories then send us a tweet or a message!
If you would like to write an article that you would like us to share (it can be about anything to do with the emergency services / NHS) whether you serve in the emergency services / NHS or whether you are a member of the public who has had a good experience with the emergency services, then feel free to contact our team; anonymously if you prefer.
We are proud to act as a voice for the emergency services, armed forces & health service, with over 500,000 people visiting our website each month.
