Littlehampton crews ‘save’ adrift visitors

Crews from Littlehampton’s RNLI station were called out to “save” two people whose broken-down boat was adrift out at sea.

They turned out to be the High Sheriff of West Sussex, David Tupper, along with his wife Hilary – who were visiting the volunteers at the town’s lifeboat station for the day.

The special guests watched as two lifeboats, each carrying three crew members, pulled alongside their drifting, rigid inflatable boat (RIB) to begin the rescue effort, and tow them back to shore.

The demonstration, was arranged by volunteer lifeboat crewman Nick Miller, who is also the operations manager at the town’s Action Boat attraction.

He took the couple out of one of Action Boat’s 300 horsepower RIBs to show them, first-hand, how the crews dealt with stranded vessels in the area.

Nick said: “It’s great to watch the lifeboats launch, but to truly appreciate what the volunteer crews do, you have to be out there.

“Our season with the boats doesn’t start till March 31, so I thought it would be a great idea to take our guests out to sea and simulate a breakdown, with the lifeboats coming to our rescue and towing us in – not that we would expect that to happen, of course!”

During the visit, Littlehampton’s RNLI operations manager Nick White also took Mr and Mrs Tupper around the facilities at the lifeboat station, in Fisherman’s Quay, where the couple spoke with lifeboat staff, shore crew, and some of the fund-raisers and volunteer shop staff, too.