Questions

Someone left some questions on one of our blogs earlier. (They are doing a project on the emergency services, good they have picked the Coastguard in my book!)

When did you become Station Officer?

On checking the records (I was quite surprised) 20th July 2002, Austen become Deputy Station Officer 1st May 2007

Have you received any certificates or awards for any rescues?

Tricky to answer this one as I'm not sure how far back you want us to go so will cover the period of our longest servicing member (John Bentham).

John was part of the team when they recovered the body of a climber in 1988 which they received a Chief Coastguards Commendation.

Ian received a letter from the District Control (1997) for the rescue of a swimmer at Studland

John received a letter from the Chief Coastguard for his work at Portland MRCC during the Napoli incident.

Ian received a letter from the Chief Coastguard for the work done to get the new Station.

Ian presented with a Paul Harris Fellow award from the Rotary Foundation of Rotary International in 2010 for work in the community.

John Bentham will be presented his Clasp to his 20 year long service medal for completion of 30 years service to the Coastguard Rescue Service. (waiting for him to get well)

Ian will be presented his long service medal for 20 years service (waiting for it to be minted!)

I think that's about it, thankfully the question wasn't how many telling offs have you had.....!

Do all MRU's (our vehicles) have the name of the station on the front doors?

This is an unofficial thing that some Coastguard teams do once the vehicle arrives on station. Its not something the Coastguard Service provide but done under a local agreement and cost.
As mentioned in the flag pole blog, the Coastguard has nearly 200 years of traditions and teams are fiercely proud of their patch and equipment. If you look at very old photos of the LSA teams they use to have their station names on their carts and slowly in modern times this tradition has come back. There is a slight problem with this as sometime vehicles are needed to be swapped about for various reasons!