Cowes RNLI lifeboat was launched late last (Wednesday) night to go to the aid of a 16-year-old girl with cystic fibrosis who became ill on a secluded beach at Gurnard.
The IW Ambulance Service were on scene along with the Needles Coastguard Rescue Team, as the terrain was too rough for a transfer on foot, Cowes Lifeboat was tasked to assist. After being helped on to the lifeboat she was brought to Trinity Landing where an ambulance was waiting on The Parade to take her to hospital.
The lifeboat launched at 11.20 pm and returned to station just after midnight.
Cowes lifeboat arrives off the Fishbourne terminal to begin its Solent search.
A full-scale air, sea and shore search was mounted in challenging wintry conditions at lunch-time today (Tuesday) over fears that a 30 year old woman might have disappeared overboard from a car ferry.
After reports that
although the woman bought a ticket at Wightlink’s Fishbourne car ferry terminal
it was believed she was not among the passengers who disembarked at Portsmouth.
Cowes RNLI lifeboat was launched just before 2pm to take part in an extensive search of the Solent, where the choppy sea was whipped up by a strong and bitterly cold easterly wind.
Also involved in the
search were Ryde and Gosport independent lifeboats, Portsmouth lifeboat and the
Lee on Solent coastguard helicopter. Meanwhile coastguard teams from Bembridge,
Ventnor and Portsmouth were tasked to investigate the relevant shorelines.
Eventually the
search was called off after police concluded that, contrary to what was first believed,
she had after all disembarked at Portsmouth.
Cowes lifeboat
returned to station just before 4 pm.
Cowes RNLI lifeboat was part of an extensive search in
darkness, lasting many hours, of a man whose personal belongings were found on
the beach at Browndown, near Gosport on Saturday.
After the police requested the search, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency triggered a call-out of the RNLI lifeboats at Cowes and Calshot, the independent lifeboat at Gosport and the Lee on Solent based coastguard helicopter. In addition, the Hampshire shore was searched by coastguard teams from Portsmouth and Hillhead.
Cowes
lifeboat was launched twice, first at 7.30 pm and again, with a fresh crew, two
hours later.
But
nothing was found by any of the searchers.
Then on Sunday Cowes lifeboat was tasked to attend an *incident in the harbour, launching at around 5 pm and returning to station about an hour later.
*Please refer to Hampshire Police for details of this incident.
A red parachute distress flare, spotted by a fisherman on the Hampshire shore, at Hill Head, resulted in an extensive two-hour land and sea search of the Solent, in pitch dark, during the early hours of this morning.
Rather
unusually, the fisherman’s emergency message to Coastguards was backed up on his
mobile phone with a video of the flare.
Both Cowes RNLI lifeboat and the Ryde independent lifeboat were tasked for the search, together with the Ventnor coastguard team.
The search patterns for the two lifeboats, with Cowes on the left.
Using
their powerful onboard searchlights, the two lifeboats painstakingly searched
an area of the Solent between Woodside Bay, Wootton and Osborne Bay. Where
there was sufficient water because of the very low tide, Ryde lifeboat also
searched Wootton Creek.
Meanwhile
the relevant Solent and creek shoreline was searched by the coastguard team.
Eventually the whole search was called off, with nothing found. Cowes Lifeboat, which had launched at 1.50 am, returned to station two hours later.
The
growing concern of a man for his missing brother sparked a land and sea search
of the Solent and Southampton Water area last (Tuesday) evening, of which Cowes
RNLI lifeboat was just one of the searchers.
HM
Coastguards had received a phone call from the ‘very distressed’ man who had come
ashore at Princes Green, Cowes, stating that he and his brother had both taken
to the water in Southampton with jet-skis. Now he just had no idea about the
whereabouts of his brother, and was increasingly worried for his safety.
Cowes
lifeboat launched at 5.45 pm, to carry out a search in the fading light between
Lepe and Calshot; also involved were Calshot RNLI lifeboat, together with land-based
coastguard teams from both sides of the Solent, plus the police.
Eventually,
at 6.14 pm, the jet-ski was found moored alongside a fishing boat, with the
missing man aboard, safe and well. Both man and his jet-ski were then taken by
Cowes lifeboat back to the brothers’ point of departure, in the River Itchen.
The Cowes RNLI lifeboat
crew ensured that two-men aboard a powerless fishing boat did not have to
linger long in a wind-swept shipping lane this afternoon.
The boat had suffered engine
failure in a Force 6-7 south-westerly and was drifting on the tide in the
Solent, one mile north-west of Cowes Harbour. This was an area where commercial
shipping took a sharp turn at speed.
Fortunately, the
lifeboat reached them well before any ships passed through, and towed their boat
to the safety of Trinity Landing.
The lifeboat which had
launched just after 2.30 pm, was soon back at the station. “Job done in just 45
minutes,” said an appreciative station operations manager, Mark Southwell.
Goodwill messages from
Cowes RNLI lifeboat station have been sent to quadraplegic cerebral palsy
sufferer Natasha Lambert, as she helps crew a specially adapted yacht for a gruelling
crossing of the Atlantic.
The 3,000-mile crossing
from Gran Canaria to St Lucia, aboard the yacht Blown Away, is to raise £30,000,
to be divided between three charities: the Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust, the
MissIsle School of Sip Puff Sailing, and Cowes RNLI.
Natasha, who lives near
Cowes, has already won wide-spread admiration for using a sip and puff control
system designed by her father to control a boat on various feats of endurance.
A message from Cowes station’s
operations manager Mark Southwell states, ‘First the Solent, then round the
Island, followed by across the Channel. Now
this….
‘Lifeboat crews well
understand what it takes to be at sea, and we have nothing but admiration for you
and your crew. Safe sailing, Tash, and fair winds!’
A general message from the station
reads: ‘Everyone at Cowes RNLI sends a heart-felt bon voyage message to you
as you set off on your biggest maritime challenge to date.
‘The station is honoured to
again to be chosen as a beneficiary of your wonderful fund-raising. Already we
are most grateful for the money raised from your past amazing exploits on the
sea, which paid for the station’s kitchen and the extra-large TV screen used
for training purposes.
‘Be sure all of us at the
station will eagerly follow your progress.
‘May you and your
fellow-crew members complete the crossing both safely and enjoyably!’
A windsurfer spotted by on-lookers
to be off his board and apparently struggling in the sea off Gurnard led to the
launching of Cowes RNLI lifeboat this evening.
People ashore raised the
alarm after seeing that the man had come off his board and seemed to be in
difficulty as he drifted westwards in the tide.
After launching at 4.15 pm
the lifeboat crew, however, found he had in fact managed to swim close to the
beach at the Little Gloster without assistance; they then merely stood by as a
precaution until reached the shore – bringing the surf-board with him.
The finding of a dinghy, with an outboard engine and oars attached, against a sea-wall at East Cowes, sparked an exhaustive search by Cowes lifeboat today.
The search, in bitterly cold winds, began at 8.29 am and lasted a total of three and a half hours; during this time the lifeboat meticulously searched the Solent between East Cowes and Egypt Point, plus Cowes Harbour and the River Medina as far as The Folly.
No-one was found, however, and eventually the four-person crew returned to station.
Investigations revealed that the dinghy had been based at Shepards Marina, alongside a yacht. It was later returned there by a Cowes Harbour Commission launch.
Back home after the massive search lifeboat helmsman Jason Hughes, said, “The wind chill factor meant that it was very cold. Now all I want is a hot drink and a hot bath!”
He said one thing they did find in the river was a motorboat that had sunk at a pile mooring. This was reported to Coastguards.
In view of the unusually long search by the volunteers aboard the lifeboat and ashore the lifeboat station stood down from service for a few hours.
Three men aboard a 25-foot motorboat who experienced trouble, three times, over on a wind-swept Solent this afternoon were saved from more serious problems by Cowes RNLI lifeboat.
First an electrical fault put the engine out of action in a Force 7 north-westerly between East Cowes and Fishbourne, then deployment of the boat’s two anchors failed to prevent the craft being driven closer to the rock-strewn shore.
A crew member alerted both Coastguards and Cowes lifeboat’s Station Manager, Mark Southwell, of their plight.
After launching at 2.15 pm the lifeboat was soon on the scene and took the motorboat in tow for Cowes Harbour. There it was given shelter by Shepards Marina, and the lifeboat returned to station at 3.25 pm.
It was the second tow-in performed by Cowes lifeboat this week. On Wednesday it went to the aid of a 30-foot yacht struggling to make headway a mile west of Cowes.
Although initially Calshot RNLI’s D Class lifeboat had first spotted the problem, its crew decided Cowes’ more powerful Atlantic 85 lifeboat was best suited for the rescue. The yacht, on passage from Yarmouth to Cowes, was taken into Shepards Marina. Coincidentally both Calshot and Cowes lifeboat were already afloat at the time of the emergency, undergoing training/assessment exercises
