Redcar's got a new lifeboat

I'm a tad annoyed at myself, because I've know for a while that something was on the cards, and for the last week I've know what it was, yet today I completely forgot to take myself and wife and son down to the sea front for the ceremony.

Anyway, Redcar's got a brand new state of the art lifeboat.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-19759181

 

Was that the one you found at the back of the museum?

 

How fantastic!!! They provide such a valuable service and my hat goes off to them.

Go, Leicester Challenge!!!

 

No, that one's the Sir James Knott. That one was second hand, we got it in the late 1960s (before I was born after Cullercoats had finished with it.

If you were to ask people round here to guess which boat was the first lifeboat to be stationed here, I'd guess that most people would say it was the Zetland, which is in the other museum, but I don't think that would be right. Certainly the Zetland served here, and is the oldest RNLI lifeboat in the world, but I don't think it was Redcar's first boat. I seem to remember reading that our first boat sank.

 

Very true. They are fantastic people. They risk their lives for no reward other than the knowledge that they're doing an amazing thing for complete strangers.

As for the Leicester connection, that crops up a lot with the Redcar branch of the RNLI. I really must have a good read to find out why. Its not like Leicester is anywhere near Redcar, but obviously there must be some connection.

 

Yes, that was my thinking on the Leicester/Redcar thing too (or maybe, it is a 'lifeboat' connection?? )

 

My brain is working a tad slowly just now. Something didn't sit right, and hours later I've only just figured it out

I was thinking how odd it was that we've just got a new boat, when we only got a new one this summer

I've just realised we didn't get a new boat today at all, it arrived in the summer. Today was just its official naming, not its arrival. Silly me.

I remember back in summer we were down the beach and I saw a new lifeboat being put through its paces. The 'old' lifeboat was out too, and the helicopter was buzzing about. They were all doing the classic wide circle searching technique, and I wondered at the time if it was for real but something about it suggested not. I remember at the time puzzling over the boat, as it was not our usual one. I figured if it was real and Hartlepool or Whitby had joined in, they'd have sent their big boats for that sort of range. The next day it was on the local news that we'd got a new boat.

As much as I now realise I was being a bit fik for not realising the difference between a new arrival and a formal naming ceremony, its still something to be proud of. Back to that day in summer, I saw the new boat open up and go off full tilt, and it did pop along a bit. It looks a lot more rugged than our old new boat too, when the Sir James Knott was decommissioned in the 1980s I remember the whinging that the new boat was just an inflatable dinghy (a dinghy that moved so fast that the crew had to fasted themselves to the floor so they wouldn't be thrown out, but still just a dinghy).

Maybe I'm a bit of geek, its just the whole thing impresses me. The crew must be amazing people, and as much as a boat is just a 'thing', it can't stay just a thing when exposed to so much trust, passion, sorrow, pain, relief, gratitude and every other emotion that must happen in a tiny vessel that goes out in all weather to try to make the difference between someone coming home or someone being lost at sea.

 

Did they ever get the quadbike back ?

Jack McH

 

That was Ripon or somewhere wasn't it?

 

Filey. Not found any reports that say it has been recovered, found this interesting site though,

http://www.itsbeennicked.co.uk/ad-category/farmmarchineryandequipment/

Tempted to put Dorset Police's Tractor on there for a laugh

 

Excellent website Zig. Still in its infancy I guess based on the fact its not well known or well populated.

Love the tractor in the pic too Why do the coppers need a tractor?

 

Cheers Dave

Been a lot of Turnip thefts around here.