A Monthly Publication

By Geoff Needham

Compared to August and September, October was a fairly quiet period with only one incident to report, on Sunday 25th Oct. at 1100 hrs while out on exercise the Lifeboat crew were alerted to the plight of two Kite surfers who had become entangled in one another’s lines and needed assistance, Yarmouth CG were informed and the Lifeboat went to their aid, one kiter managed to free himself and made his way to the beach, the other kiter was pulled into the L/boat and the crew untangled him from his rig and landed him to the beach along with his rig,

Sunday 8th November members of the crew along with other organizations mustered at the British Legion and took part in the annual Remembrance parade to the Cenotaph and service at St Edmunds Church.

News from the past

The first service launch carried out by the Hunstanton Lifeboat Licensed Victuallar was  in 1867 on November 18th to the Barque Thetis of Gothenburg which had gone aground on the Woolpack sands north east of Hunstanton the vessel was breaking up and the crew 16 Swedish seamen had taken to the barques boat, and were rescued by the Hunstanton L/boat and brought ashore at Hunstanton.

December  7th 1867  the Steamship Harmonia of Hamburg ran aground off Brancaster in a north easterly gale. the L/boat launched and had to contend with heavy seas and a strong north easterly on its passage to Brancaster, on arrival it was found that the passengers had been landed on Brancaster beach by the ships boats, but because of the weather conditions were unable to return to fetch the crew off, Hunstanton L/boat  in severe weather conditions made it out to the vessel and took off her 15 remaining crew and landed them  ashore.

May 24th 1979 a D class inflatable number D-181was placed on station, and the station was reopened having been closed since July 1931.  The first launch on service was on July 8th 1979 two people in a rubber inflatable were saved, one of many such services to be carried out in the thirty years the station has been operational.