Local Patrols

The team has been out this weekend checking paths, trails and routes at Studland.
We had a late night search in freezing fog at this very location earlier this week, and it's at times like that with almost no visibility that the local knowledge patrols really pay off.

Special snacks

It seems the team now have snacks named after them. These were found in the vehicle after a call out this week.

Eric The Old Shunter

Coastguard Bravo has been on his hols and spotted Eric in Cornwall. 

This is Eric - he is an old shunter in a blue livery. He is powered by a 22hp Perkins engine. He has 6 wheel drive for traction up the steep incline to the station. He is 10 and 1/4 inch gauge.

This is Eric  - also in blue livery. He is powered by roast dinners and has two wheel drive for traction up the steep hill after an afternoon in The British Legion.  I can't comment on his gauge. 

                              

Swanage Carnival Volunteer by day - Swanage Coastguard Volunteer by night.

The full Swanage Coastguard Team were deployed to a dog over cliff at Old Harry - a cliff rescue. Not our favourite place, Old Harry, given the cliff face.

Luckily the dog 'Tarka' survived the fall and was picked up by a passing vessel and taken to South Beach, Studland.

Colleagues from St Albans Coastguard were also paged but stood down when the dog was recovered by a passing boat.

Dogs on leads - how apt.

The team reunited the owner with their dog.


Highlight of the evening was our very own Eric Hudson who turned up at the job - dressed in his Swanage Carnival red shirt and sporting face paint - dog paw prints! 

Well it was the Swanage Carnival Dog Show today!

...as ever - please keep your dog on a lead when walking near to cliffs.

Hudson-Patrick Tan Test ©

It was rather sunny earlier today....but it looks like the sea fog has just rolled in.

Eric Hudson had his legs out at the station showing off his suntan, he’s been in Tenerife - he's always in Tenerife!; Roger Patrick had his shorts on too trying to get a tan, he’s also been in working somewhere exotic - Corfe Mullen. 

It's fair to say Eric beats Roger hands down on the tan - by way of comparison.

Eric's legs

Roger's legs

Terry's head is as brown as a hot cross bun, although without the cross, and no raisins....or orange peel come to think of it. Duncan was looking slightly pale, but he's a teacher and gets the next 16 weeks off on summer holiday so plenty of time to catch up.

Tom looked quite brown which is odd given he works nights, sleeps during the day and is scared of the sun; not a big fan of garlic either I'm told.

In order to stop disputes as to who is the brownest I’ve decided to implement the Hudson-Patrick Tan Test © which will be based on a colour chart by a well known wood stain manufacturer, rather than chicken legs.

This will allow HM Coastguard tans to be graded fairly.

At the moment Eric’s legs are somewhere between an ‘Oxford Brown’ and ‘Saddle Tan’, whereas Terry’s bonce is closer to ‘Redwood’ than ‘Sequoia’.

I’m afraid Roger's legs are currently ‘Cape Cod Grey’ although he’ll probably be ‘Harvest Brown’ by mid July.

Oh the Coastguardy bit, make sure you take care in the sun and cover up betweeen 11:00 and 15:00 when the sun is at its hottest. ...What sun I hear you say!

Country Gents

Ooh Arr 

The elder statesmen at the debrief on Saturday. Sort of reminded me of Jack Hargreaves "out of town".

Eric gets the torch.........along with the charger

The task was simple........

Get kitted up with your Personal protective equipment (PPE), load the vehicle with torches and lets get going.

This was on Monday night when the team got tasked to search for two walkers lost between Dancing Ledge and Belle Vue Farm.

Things were going well until Eric went to get the last torch from its charger - a strange noise and a large amount of laughter as Eric stood there with the torch and CHARGER in his hand.

Well done Eric, why not bring the whole thing with you, I'm sure you will find a socket in a field to plug the torch into.

Credit to Eric, he came in very quietly on Tuesday's kit night with new wall plugs and reattached the  charger to the wall.

Hog Roast or Jacket Spud?

Looks like Coastguard Eric has been caught red handed at the carnival Hog Roast....so that's why he's a Swanage Carnival volunteer!

Eric: Deciding whether to have a jacket spud instead ...yeah right you are!

Eric - He's no stranger at the Hog Roast tent

In other hopefully unrelated news - Peppa Pig star of the Swanage Parish Fete hasn't been seen for a few days?

Ask Eric

At training the other night we were discussing the amount of rain we'd had and how it could affect Sandpit Field and the various events that are held there through the summer.

'Its OK', reassured Eric, 'they're getting some webbing'

'Webbing?' asked Tom

'Yes, webbing' replied Eric, very much the man in the know.

'What sort of webbing?' continued Tom

'You know, normal webbing.  Just webbing'

'To go on the ground?  Will it help?'

'Yes, I expect so.  Its webbing' said Eric.

'Is it fabric?'

'I don't know, its webbing.  You know - webbing'

I'm not sure we did know, to be honest.  As a result, Eric kindly offered to go away and research the subject and has promised a full technical briefing next time.  In the meantime, if you see him around town and want to know about the webbing, Ask Eric.

Webbing Advice? - Ask Eric!

Eric performs a miracle

This morning the team were paged to a report of a body on the north end of the beach.

Eric responded followed closely by Lee who claimed his 1st ever call out. Fearing the worse Eric and Lee were thinking of contacting Tom who is a specialist in this type of incident however they arrived on scene to start searching.

A good look around and still nothing to could be found, Portland MRCC recontacted the 1st informant to try and confirm the location and were told.........

"The body has got up and was seen heading towards Ocean Bay ! "

Clearly Eric had performed a miracle a talent we had not previously seen, a good result for a possible distressing incident.

But it did not end there...... Having had his 1st incident Lee decided to seek his 2nd and at lunchtime along with Swanage ILB, they were tasked to meet the ILB towing in a dinghy from Peveril Point.

March has arrived, the sun come out and people are out and about. Remember if you see or you think someone is in trouble - dial 999 and asked the Coastguard.

Bridge Building

It was kit night last night, so Ian brought in this model kit railway bridge called Eric. Strange name for a bridge, but thats what it said on the blue paper.Ultimately we hope to extend the layout right round the station with Eric the bridge forming the link across the door of what used to be the training room, now the model railway room. The tunnel through to the former office is nearly complete and once we've found alternative accomodation for the truck we'll be moving into the garage too.

Alarm!

The Station Alarm is going off which means one of two things. Either we have burglars, or Eric is over the Station.

A quick peeps out of the window ....and its Eric!

We used to think that he couldn't remember the code and accidentally set it off ....but we have since found out that he does it deliberately to let the community of North Swanage know when he's on station.

Just for a laugh he sometimes likes to punch the burglar alarm code into the fire alarm system and set both off for good measure.

Still at least he didn't try and break into the Station like these two numpties.

I see

I see said Eric, testing out a new pair of binoculars ...... Bright yellow should be easy to spot and at least he had them the right way round whilst testing them.

This was training the other night with Allan our new Sector Manager, chart work was the main topic followed by map work , tea drinking and finally testing the lighting equipment as the nights are drawing in quickly.

Blankets

You think you know someone then they pull a surprise.......

During the incident at Corfe Castle we were packing up the kit and suddenly we found that Eric had a new talent.......blanket folding.

Not just a normal blanket fold, but all corners met, in fact if we had an iron he would have got the creases out.

So any hotel out there wanting their blankets folded, Eric is your man.

Another visit to Corfe

(An early entry for photo of the year?)

The IRT has just returned from a helivac (evacuation by helicopter) at Corfe Castle where a male had injured himself when he slipped over in almost exactly the same spot as a similar incident last year. Right at the top.

So it was no struggle for CROs Hudson and Field to run to the very top of the castle again, since having been on duty last time they knew the routine well. No really, it was a breeze on a baking hot day and in full PPE. Eric even muttered something about recalling every step. The big difference from last time is that Resuce 106 was able to airlift the casualty away rather than the team having to bring him down by stretcher to a waiting ambulance.

Nick reckons that when you think about it, its a daft idea putting castles at the top of a hill. It's asking for trouble.

Oh, and apologies to the disgruntled tourist who, having paid his entry money, was upset to be moved away from the helicopter site so the operation could be carried out safely. He'd paid his money, and he had every right to be there! He said so himself. Er, yes. Fancy a shotblasted face from the downdraught of a helicopter do you? Thought not...

The Hud is back

No sooner than he lands back in the UK, the Hudson is back in action and doing his stuff on the beach. Along with Nick and Austen who decided to tag along with the IRT they soon had the situation under control. A VERY special team member also got involved in the incident (purely a monitoring involvement), tune in tomorrow to find out who this was.

50p for the Meter?

To ensure a reliable radio reception all over our patch, the coastguard has a VHF repeater aerial high on the hills overlooking Swanage.

Today, Portland Co-ordination Centre noticed a fault light on their indicator panel suggesting the repeater wasn't working properly. Whilst this wasn't an immediate problem it could hamper communications during an emergency, so the team were sent to check out the fault.

It seems the main power supply was down, but fortunately the back up generator had burst into life as intended and was maintaining the service. As the team couldn't find 50p for the meter, the information was relayed to Portland and a man with a screwdriver was called in to try to remedy the fault.

Eric looking for the fault.....

....and then writing a 'To Do' list before his Golfing Weekend.

Hudson-Thompson Tan Test ©

Regular readers will know of the Hudson-Thompson Tan Test ©

http://swanagecoastguard.blogspot.com/2010/05/hudson-thompson-tan-test.html

Brian came to the station the other day to show that his Cape Cod Grey legs were now Cedar Tone and progressing well towards Harvest Brown.

I've just come back off hols and reckon I'm Oxford Brown although a shower tonight will confirm whether it is a tan or just dirt. As my mum reads this blog I wish to confirm that I was using factor 30 suncream.

Oh the Coastguardy bit, make sure you take care in the sun and cover up betweeen 11:00 and 15:00 when the sun is at its hottest. ...What sun I hear you say!

Covert Coastguard

To ensure we continue to provide the level of service to the town, we are now doing "under cover Coastguarding".

Various team members take up position in key areas of the town, and observe the great British public and leap into action if required.

One slight issue yesterday that Eric and I managed to choose the same place, but give Eric the credit not only was free coffee on offer but he was pretending to work too....excellent Eric you beat me that day!

So keep your eyes open for other members of the team in key positions see if you can spot them!

Agent Eric and the Top Secret Photos

Agent Eric has passed over a top secret roll of film (well camera memory card) containing previously unseen photos of the team in action. Eric is like an undercover roving reporter, and a very well tanned one at that. I shall 'leak' this top secret information over the next few days.

Here is Ian being interviewed by none other than Roger Finn from BBC South Today

He used to present John Craven's Newsround. 

...Roger Finn obviously, not Ian.