Lifejackets - do you wear yours?

Kayakers in trouble off Anvil Point

Just before the patrol set off this afternoon, Portland Coastguard tasked the Coastguard Initial Response Team along with the Swanage RNLI inshore lifeboat.

Several members of the public had called the Coastguard concerned for 3 kayakers off Durlston Head. One person was reported in the water holding on to their craft supported by the other. A passing Border Agency vessel 'Searcher' also deployed their fast boat to assist and as the Coastguard arrived their boat located the pair in the water.

Swanage Inshore Lifeboat arrived very quickly after and assisted the pair into the Border Agency boat before heading off to find the 3rd kayak in Durlston Bay. With everyone safely ashore and warmed up in the Lifeboat house, the Coastguard assisted by transporting the kayakers back to Studland.

Later in the afternoon, the Coastguard Patrol came across a local lady who had stepped on a weever fish. The spines on this fish cause a nasty sting similar to a wasp sting so the Coastguard assisted by staff at Middle Beach Cafe Studland gave 1st aid. (Basically a very hot tub of water)

Landslip update

The scene this week and with the bank holiday, the advice is still to keep off the slips and keep away from the cliffs edges.

Blue Flag for Swanage

This morning it has been announced that Swanage has retained it's Blue Flag for its main beach.

The Blue Flag works towards sustainable development of beaches and marinas through strict criteria dealing with Water Quality, Environmental Education and Information, Environmental Management, and Safety and Other Services.

We play a part in this award around the safety and education, working with the other emergency services and beach wardens.

Good news for Swanage and all that have worked hard in keeping the beach clean, tidy and safe.

Day after the assessment

The scene at the station this morning after yesterday's cliff assessment.

For four hours the team were put through their paces in the various roles that make up the team.

Officer in charge, Cliff technician, Operator and awareness trained make up the team. Of course every visit recently to St Albans Head results in rain and the kit soon got wet!

The St Albans team also popped along as they had a couple of their team to be assessed so both team were in action. This was ok till it was discovered there was two Steve's and two Ian's where is got a little confusing with instructions.

I'm please to say the team passed and saw a number of the team gain new qualifications, even the Station Officer had a practice over the cliff!

Our very special thanks to Hilary the Southampton Sector Manager and Steve, the Portsmouth Sector Manager who kindly came to carry out the assessment.
St Albans for the use of their patch and of course the team for all their hard work in preparation for this assessment.

Just got to dry and pack the kit up now.

Don't drink and drown

An incident on the east coast this morning nearly cost someone their life.

The MCA issued this press release

Roger and Ruth

Regular readers may recall our new team member Ruth Lee who joined the team last week.

Roger has taken it under his wing to help Ruth find her way around and show her the ropes, and tonight he kindly offered to take her to training over at Peveril.  Properly seat belted in, and with the trade mark arm on the window ledge Ruth seemed to thoroughly enjoy the trip, although Roger reckons she was a bit quiet.
On arrival at the training site, Ruth was helped out of Roger's Land Rover and unceremoniously thrown down a steep hillside, landing in a heap at the bottom. 



Ruth Lee - great for those car sharing lanes where you need 2+ people

Ruth was safely recovered and returned to the station where we debriefed the exercise over a mug of tea. Her next public appearance will be on Sunday morning when we have our team Rope Rescue re-assessment  at St Aldhelms Head.  Now she knows what's in store, I wonder if she'll be quite as keen...

Traction Engine Crash - Corfe Castle

Coastguard Nick had a lucky escape about 45 mins ago!

He was standing outside having a quiet pint when a traction engine appears to have ....lost traction. Nick managed to pick his daughter up and run out of the way and not spill a drop of beer; that's Coastguard training for you :-)

Everyone is ok.

## It's a Steam Roller not a Traction Engine.... easy mistake to make when the front half is missing.

Photo: Nick Field- Swanage Coastguard

Train - ing meeting

This weekend is the Swanage Railway diesel gala

So whilst having a quiet cup of tea in the buffet car , Eric pops in having been to look at some work at the station, followed by Gareth out enjoying the event.

So we decided to have a train ing meeting!

Trains are running all weekend and involve beer drinking at Corfe if you like.

New team member

As we are a couple of team members short at the moment we have decided to supplement the team using "Ruth Lee".

It's also an indication that we have an assessment coming up!

Groyne Numbering complete

The project to number the groynes has finally been finished this weekend.

Starting with the groyne near Walrond road at number 1 then north to Shep Hollows finishing at number 18.

The main purpose of the numbering is to help identify areas much quicker should there be an emergency. There then is the land slide area which covers between 12 and 14.

14 being the area where people have been getting stuck.

Special thanks to Nick, Kyle, Catherine and Sophie for giving up their time to get it finished. - same time next year to repaint them ?

Engine kill cords.

Desperately sad news yesterday with the death of two persons in a boating incident in the Camel Estuary, North Cornwall.

Having been thrown from a boat at speed myself I know how important it is to fit a kill cord. They are very cheap to fit, and should be tested when you do your safety checks every time you take the boat out.

The RYA provide some good advice.

Coffee Apology

The other day I was sent a text by Roger a team member who wishes to remain anonymous.

He said that I was a 'cheeky monkey' (or words to that effect) for putting a photo of him on the blog showing him drinking a cappuccino before 07:00am.

He was particulary vexed by the fact I had incorrectly stated that he was drinking a cappuccino... when it was clearly a latte. It was remiss of me to not to recognise the difference.

Sorry Roger anonymous team member.

Not Roger, not drinking a cappuccino. 

Anyway, hopefully that's all cleared up now.

Other Coastguard Cappuccino stories 

Early Morning in Swanage

A wonderful start to the day at 7am this morning.

Breakfast , the most important meal of the day

X-Large Photo X-Large Breakfast X-Large Latte

The most important meal of the day (so we are told).

We have protected the identify of the individual who stocked up last week before training but would like to say there has been previous photos of the individual in the same location.

Fancy having two coffees !

Another goodbye

Sadly another good bye this week, with Lee leaving the team.

Lee joined the team having previously been one of the beach wardens in Swanage so knew the area very well.  Lee brought  a number of specialist skills to the team including searching for missing people which we have a number of in Swanage.

At Christmas Lee was awarded along with Roger, Team member of the year after his work on searches and mapping various routes and landing sites in the patch.

We would like to thank Lee for all his work at the Station and wish him all the best for the future.

Painting by numbers

From our recent landslide meetings, we took an action away to continue the numbering of the gyones. Two years ago the Town Council numbered the first five to help identify incidents which may occur and help the public know where they are.

With the recent landslides and the chances of further incidents in the future, Purbeck District Council agreed the numbering could be extended north to Sheps Hollow to help emergency services quickly establish the area.

Swanage Town Council kindly supplied the paint and stencils, the Coastguard is supplying the voluntary man power.

*It appears the Town Council have given us two number 6 stencils but no number 9.....  :-)