When England play ....

The scene last week when England was playing football....

The usual busy view point over looking Poole Harbour was almost empty !




At least the queue for the ice cream van wasn’t long !

Swimmer rescued at Poole Harbour entrance

A swimmer had a lucky escape this afternoon when they got into difficulties near to the chain ferry.

Poole Inshore Lifeboat launched along with Coastguard teams from Swanage and Poole tasked to investigate.

On arrival the Swanage Coastguard team were pointed to the direction of the male and managed to spot the swimmer struggling in the water.
A small passing boat went to the swimmers assistance but were unable to recover him aboard.
The Coastguard team directed the lifeboat to the swimmer who took him aboard and ashore to North Haven.

Due to the condition of the swimmer an ambulance was requested and conveyed the male to hospital.

The swimmer had started his swim at shell bay when he was swept across the path of the chain ferry.
He was lucky to be spotted with rescue units close by to rescue him.

Due to the strong current it is not advisable to swim near to the harbour entrance.

Coastal emergency dial 999 - Coastguard.

How to call the Coastguard

So if you decide to head to the coast. ( to avoid the football)

See someone in trouble or need assistance.

Studland

The Station Officer and Deputy joined forces with the Neighbourhood Police Team last week to brief the wardens at  Studland.
The National Trust employs its own Rangers and these are supplemented in the summer by a private security firm. Last week's meeting gave us all a chance to agree the common approach on calling the emergency services and how we could expect each other to respond in a  variety of incidents such as missing children, the discovery of ordnance, antisocial behaviour etc.  It's good to get these protocols established at the start of the season and we look forward to another successful summer with the NT.

An Evening at St Albans Head

Our flank team at St Albans invited us to a joint training session last week, so the team headed to Worth to join them and from there, out to St Albans head itself.

teams working together at the top

It's always good to train in unfamiliar locations and the cliff at St Albans offers an opportunity to run the set up over a double ledge - ie the technician decends from the operating level down the cliff face to the next ledge below, before walking out to the edge of that and descending over the edge of that too.

The view going over the second ledge

On a glorious summer evening, we managed to get 6 technicians over the cliff whilst the rest of the teams took it in turns to operate the main and safety lines and the tugger recovery system.

Assisted descent (the second, untrained person could be a paramedic or police officer etc)

Policy is to task two teams to a rope rescue, and so it makes sense for flank teams to train together, and our thanks to the team at St Albans for the invite.

Some different scenery at St Albans!

A long afternoon

As the sun sets on Swanage the team have just completed six hours of searching and five incidents during that time.

This afternoons patrol headed straight to the sunken boat off the boat park to check on the pollution.
Thankfully nothing was found and the boat has now been recovered to the boat park.

The team were then tasked to assist Dorset Police with a search for a missing 60 year old female. Making several sweeps of the shoreline from Ballard to Peveril Point the lady was found by Police in the town. DorSAR and the RNLI lifeguards also assisted in the search.

During the search the team also dealt with a motor boat which was believed to have broken down, a missing child which was quickly located and a jet ski which appeared in trouble.

A special thank you to several local cafes who kindly looked after the team in providing drinks and food to them during the search.

Could you volunteer ?

We are still looking for Coastguard Rescue Officers in Swanage and other local teams.



You may only have a few hours in the day that you could be free to respond, so why not come and have a chat.

It’s not all rescue work , there is public engagements , training and of course a way to meet new people .

If you are interested, get in touch with a team member, leave your details at the Station in North Beach Car Park or drop us a note on Facebook.

Exercise Combined Approach

Coastguard Teams from Swanage St Albans and Poole came together at Studland this week for a large search and rescue exercise.

The scenario saw two “over due “ walkers visiting the area go missing.

Search teams deployed and found both persons but that was only the start with both having to be extracted from difficult locations.




There is someone in there somewhere !
Our thanks to ‘Dave’ who played a challenging casualty along with some realistic makeup to test the first aid assessments


Team members from three local Coastguard teams combine to form search teams.


The second extraction was a little more difficult and required a double rope rescue set up.


Working in difficult conditions the second casualty was recovered.

Twenty plus Coastguard Rescue Officers practising their skills.

Coastal emergency ? 999 Coastguard

Team work

The team met our new sea front ambassador this week , part of the Tourist Information Centre team.

Working together we all work to improve the safety of the beach and maintain the standards of an award winning blue flag beach.

If you have an emergency on the beach or out to sea 999 Coastguard.

Come and meet us at the fish festival

We are back at the fish festival today so pop by to find out about the Coastguard.