200 years since the birth of the RNLI, Royal National Lifeboat Institution. Thus in two centuries, sea volunteers have saved more than 146,000 lives.
The RNLI is the UK nonprofit that saves lives at sea. They deal with SAR and safety education or in cases of flooding. A kind of coast guard, but made entirely of volunteers with the sole purpose of rescuing those who risk their skins in the water.
RNLI: the volunteers who save lives at sea.
Shipwrecked in the Irish Sea in the late 1800s was not a remote possibility. Fortunately, there have been people with willpower beyond habit who have moved to change the status quo. Among them was Sir William Hillary, who lived on the Isle of Man and had witnessed many shipwrecks around him. The island is, in fact, in the middle of the Irish Sea, between Great Britain and precisely Ireland. From an appeal by him, the RNLI, Royal National Lifeboat Institution, was born in a London tavern on March 4, 1824.
The name originally was “Royal National Institution for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck.” It was later changed to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) in 1854. In that year an aspect was intuited that would later become the basis of safety at sea over the centuries. Life jackets! Today they are definitely more comfortable than the ones crews wore at that time with cork padding.
The numbers and importance of this organization speak for themselves: since its founding in 1824, volunteer crews have gone to sea in rescue operations 380,328 times. A total of 144,277 lives were saved, plus 2,000 lives were saved by lifeguards who joined the RNLI lifesaving service in 2001. Two lives per day on average.
Amid world wars and challenges of all kinds (including financial ones) the RNLI has always managed to move forward. From rowing lifeboats there has been a shift to significantly more modern means, just as the personal safety equipment available to crews has also changed.
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Today the RNLI operates 238 lifeguard stations throughout the UK and Ireland, including four on the Thames, and has seasonal lifeguards on more than 240 protected beaches throughout the UK. It designs and builds its own lifeboats and manages national and international water safety programs.
When life jackets became mandatory
It was 1861. A storm had hit North Yorkshire, England, and bringing rescue to the boats was the crew from Whitby. All was going well, and five times volunteers had brought the castaways ashore. On the sixth launch, however, a wave capsized the lifeboat and all the crew members. They all died except Henry Freeman. He was the only one wearing a new model of cork life jacket. After this event, the cork life jacket became a must-have for rescuers.
The flagship of the fleet
Penlee Point, south of Newlyn on the outskirts of Mousehole, is an infamous place in Cornwall. On December 19, 1981, the RNLI lifeboat Solomon Browne set sail to rescue the ship Union Star, which had broken down off these shores. His engines had failed due to heavy seas. The Solomon Browne retrieved four people, but failed to return. Both the ship and the lifeboat were lost and sixteen people died.
The current Penlee Lifeboat Station life boat is a Severn class, the largest in the RNLI fleet. With a length of more than 17 meters and a weight of more than 40 tons, the vessel is powered by twin engines delivering more than 3,000 hp. This means that the lifeboat can reach a maximum speed of 25 knots, but consumes about 1,000 liters of fuel per hour.
If you would like to support the daily work of RNLI volunteers,
here is the link
to support operations, vehicles and staff.
