At 5.06am on Friday 9^th May 2008, the Seahouses Lifeboat Mechanic was awoken at his home by a local fishing boat skipper, asking for urgent assistance, as his vessel moored in the harbour, was sinking. The Mechanic informed the Station Operations Manager at once, who immediately paged the Lifeboat Crew. The Inshore Lifeboat “Peter Downes” was launched, carrying the salvage pump from the All Weather Lifeboat, taking it to the vessel. The casualty was the 32ft wooden fishing vessel “Madonna”, which had been beached beside the lifeboat slip in the harbour, for annual maintenance and repainting. The vessel had settled awkwardly on her port side at low tide, and as the tide came in, the vessel had not lifted properly and water had flooded the gunnel and deck, filling the hull. The situation was discovered by her skipper on an early morning routine check on his vessel. All attempts with the salvage pump failed to make headway. A number of lifeboat crew were also conveyed to the vessel, to stand on the starboard side of the boat, in an effort to lift the vessel, without success. No one was injured, and there was no pollution from the incident. The tide continued to rise till 5.58am (High water). Meanwhile all electronic equipment was salvaged from the vessel as a precaution. Once the tide fell, Lifeboat crew returned with their pump, to pump out the water, in case the weight of it damaged the timber hull of the vessel. It is expected that the vessel will be refloated on the next high tide. Humber Coastguard were informed of the situation. Lifeboat Operations Manager Ian Clayton commented “ The Lifeboat had launched on exercise earlier that night, and we had commented on “Madonna’s” smart new paint job, as she lay on the beach. There was no indication of any problem at that time. What happened was a piece of really bad luck, we all just hope there is no serious long term damage to the vessel. “

At 10.08pm on Tuesday 1^st April 2008, Humber Coastguard informed the Seahouses Lifeboat Operations Manager about an ongoing search by Coastguard teams, following two reports of possible red flares at sea, north of the Farne Islands. After the first report, radio messages had been broadcast to local shipping, without result, and shore based Coastguard Teams had searched, but seen nothing. Following the second report, there was concern in case the origin was a small vessel in that area. It was agreed to launch both the Seahouses All Weather and Inshore Lifeboats without delay, to effect a search from the Islestone on the shore to the north side of the Farnes Islands. Radar and searchlights were used, and further VHF radio broadcasts were made, but nothing was found. A helicopter from RAF Boulmer also joined the search, and the coastline was searched from the shore by local coastguard teams, who had been mobilised from a weekly local training session.

After finding nothing, both Lifeboats and the helicopter were recalled to station. Lifeboat Operations Manager Ian Clayton commented “ These incidents are always unsatisfactory, and although a very thorough search was made of the area by all of the rescue resources, you always have a nagging worry in case something was missed. “ No local vessels were overdue or unaccounted for.

The incident was a false alarm with good intent, and whatever was seen, remains a mystery.
Ends.

 

At 5.40pm on Tuesday 15^th January 2008, Humber Coastguard informed the Seahouses Lifeboat Operations Manager about an ongoing search by Coastguard teams, following a report from a shore angler at Dunstanburgh Castle near Craster, of white and yellow flares at sea, north of that location. Messages had been broadcast to local shipping, and coastguards on the shore had seen a possible object and light in the water near the North Sunderland Buoy. Seahouses Lifeboats were about to launch anyway on their two weekly exercise at 6pm that night, so the Lifeboat Operations Manager agreed to launch the All Weather Lifeboat “Grace Darling” on service early, to search the section of coastline.