Weymouth Lifeboat Station is the base for Royal National Lifeboat Institution

Royal National Lifeboat Institution

The Royal National Lifeboat Institution is a charity that saves lives at sea around the coasts of Great Britain, Ireland, the Channel Islands and the Isle of Man, as well as on selected inland waterways....

 (RNLI) search and rescue operations at Weymouth in Dorset

Dorset

Dorset , is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The county town is Dorchester which is situated in the south. The Hampshire towns of Bournemouth and Christchurch joined the county with the reorganisation of local government in 1974...

, England. The first lifeboat

Lifeboat (rescue)

A rescue lifeboat is a boat rescue craft which is used to attend a vessel in distress, or its survivors, to rescue crewmen and passengers. It can be hand pulled, sail powered or powered by an engine...

 was stationed in the town in 1869. Since 2002 it has operated a all weather lifeboat (ALB) and an inshore lifeboat (ILB).

History

The Royal National Institution for Preserving Life from Shipwreck (as the RNLI was then known) provided a lifeboat at Portland in 1826 but it was withdrawn in 1851. The Earl of Strafford asked for a lifeboat to be stationed at Weymouth in 1868 and his request was granted when a new RNLI station opened on 26 January the following year. A boathouse was built along with a slipway into harbour. The boathouse was rebuilt in 1921 to allow it to receive a motor lifeboat, although this was not on station until 1924. In 1930 a new Barnett class lifeboat was stationed at Weymouth. This was too large to fit into the boathouse so was kept at moorings in the harbour, an arrangement that continues to this day. In 2003 access to the boat was made easier by the construction of a floating pontoon.

Since 1995 the all weather lifeboat has been supported by an ILB. This is housed in a separate boathouse built nearer the entrance to the harbour in 1996.

Service awards

The volunteer crews of the RNLI do not expect reward or recognition for their work, but many rescues have been recognised by letters, certificates and medals from the RNLI management. The following are just some of the most notable.

In 1948 three people were rescued from the yacht Mite during an operation that lasted eleven hours. For this Coxswain

Coxswain

The coxswain is the person in charge of a boat, particularly its navigation and steering. The etymology of the word gives us a literal meaning of "boat servant" since it comes from cox, a coxboat or other small vessel kept aboard a ship, and swain, which can be rendered as boy, in authority. ...

 Frederick Palmer was awarded an RNLI Bronze medal. The following year he received a Silver Medal and Motor Mechanic James McDermott a Bronze Medal for their rescue of four people from a steam tug.

The rescue of five crew members from the yacht Dehra resulted in the award of a Bronze Medal to lifeboatman Donald Laker in 1965. Another was awarded in 1972 to Coxswain Alfred Pavey following the rescue of an injured crewman from the yacht Nomis.

On 14 October 1976 the lifeboat put to sea in a hurricane to assist the yacht Latifa and her crew of eight. In charge of the rescue was Second Coxswain Victor Pitman. He did not have a full crew of trained lifeboatmen and so two fishermen volunteered to make the crew up to strength. Pitman was awarded a Silver Medal and all the crew – both regular volunteers and the fishermen – received recognition for their work that day.

A Bronze Medal was awarded to Coxswain/Mechanic Derek Sargent for leading the rescue on 16 October 1987 of the crew of five from the catamaran

Catamaran

A catamaran is a type of multihulled boat or ship consisting of two hulls, or vakas, joined by some structure, the most basic being a frame, formed of akas...

 Sunbeam Chaser during a storm off Portland Bill

Portland Bill

Portland Bill is a narrow promontory of Portland stone, which forms the most southerly part of Isle of Portland, and therefore also the county of Dorset, England....

.

Description

The 1869 lifeboat station is still used for crew facilities but the space once occupied by the lifeboat between launches is now used as a fund-raising gift shop. It is built from stone and faces the harbour. Above the boat doors is a bay window lookout. At the top of the gable is a date stone carved '1924' to commemorate when the building was modified for the arrival of its first motor lifeboat, the Samuel Oakes. Opposite the boathouse is a metal bridge leading to the floating pontoon where the ALB is moored.

Much closer to the harbour entrance is the boathouse built in 1996. This is a long. Low building that opens immediately onto a wide slipway down which the ILB is pushed on its carriage to reach the water.

Area of operation

The RNLI aims to reach any casualty up to 50 miles (80.5 km) from its stations, and within two hours in good weather. To do this the lifeboat at Weymouth has an operating range of 250 nautical miles (463 km) and a top speed of 25 knots (49 km/h). Adjacent lifeboats are stationed at to the east, and to the west. There is also an ILB at between Weymouth and Exmouth.

Current fleet

17-32 Ernest and Mabel (Official Number 1261, on station 2002) which is kept moored afloat alongside. B-746 Phyl Clare III (on station 1998) which is launched by hand on a slipway.

• Boarding Boat BB-026

Former lifeboats

'ON' is the RNLI's sequential Official Number; 'Op. No.' is the operational number painted onto the boat.

Pulling and sailing lifeboats

ON	Name	Built	At Weymouth	Class	Comments
	Agnes Harriet		1869–1887
	Friern Watch		1887–1903
513	Friern Watch	1903	1903–1924		Sold in 1925 and converted to a yacht. Sank in 1965.

Motor lifeboats

ON	Op. No.	Name	Built	At Weymouth	Class	Comments
651	–	Samuel Oakes	1918	1924–1929		Sold in 1933, destroyed in 1980.
721	–	Lady Kylsant	1929	1929–1930	Watson	Sold in 1956, broken up in 2003.
735	–	William and Clara Ryland	1930	1930–1957		Modified for use as a house boat at Hoo Hoo Hoo is used in placenames in the east of England to indicate coastal peninsulas and promontories. It appears in:* Fort Hoo, a fort on an island in the River Medway, Kent* Hoo St Werburgh and Cliffe-at-Hoo on the Hoo Peninsula in Kent* Hoo, Suffolk... .
939	–	Frank Spiller Locke	1957	1957–1976	Barnett	Sold in 1986, reported in use as a pleasure boat at Dartmouth, Devon Dartmouth, Devon Dartmouth is a town and civil parish in the English county of Devon. It is a tourist destination set on the banks of the estuary of the River Dart, which is a long narrow tidal ria that runs inland as far as Totnes...  in 2007.
1049	54-04	Tony Vandervell	1975	1976–1999		Sold for further use as lifeboat MacElliott at Porkkala Porkkala Porkkala is a peninsula in the Gulf of Finland located at Kirkkonummi in Southern Finland.The peninsula had great strategic value, as coastal artillery based there would be able to reach more than halfway across the Gulf of Finland... , Helsinki Helsinki Helsinki is the capital and largest city in Finland. It is in the region of Uusimaa, located in southern Finland, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, an arm of the Baltic Sea. The population of the city of Helsinki is , making it by far the most populous municipality in Finland. Helsinki is... , Finland Finland Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside... .
1160	52-46	Duke of Atholl	1990	1999–1999	Arun	Sold in 2007 for further use as a lifeboat in Iceland Iceland Iceland , described as the Republic of Iceland, is a Nordic and European island country in the North Atlantic Ocean, on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. Iceland also refers to the main island of the country, which contains almost all the population and almost all the land area. The country has a population... .
1073	52-18	Robert Edgar	1981	1999–2002	Arun	Reported working as a pleasure boat in 2007 at Tatukala, New Zealand New Zealand New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga... .

Inshore lifeboats

Op. No.	Name	At Weymouth	Class	Type
B-541	Elizabeth Bestwick	1995–1996	B
B-544	Catherine Plumbley	1996–1996	B	Atlantic 21
B-543	Round Table	1996–1997	B	Atlantic 21
B-512	U.S. Navy League	1997–1998	B	Atlantic 21
B-525	Spix's Macaw	1998–1998	B	Atlantic 21

External links

• Official station website
• RNLI station information