THREE YOUNG GIRLS CUT OFF BY TIDE IGNORE RESCUERS

Press release: 138-11                                                        20 May 2011

At 17:03 pm MRCC Humber received a 999 call reporting 3 female children cut off by the tide at Marsden Beach near Camel Island. Sunderland Coastguard team were called out and proceeded immediately as well as Tynemouth RNLI Inshore Lifeboat.

Sunderland Coastguard located the girls from a vantage point at the top of Marsden cliffs and managed to communicate the lifeboat to their location but the girls refused to listen to the instructions from the Coastguard rescue officers and the lifeboat crew to remain where they were and started to scramble along the rocks and through some sea caves putting themselves in extreme peril.

The lifeboat and Coastguard team could only standby and watch anxiously as the girls finally managed to get to a safe area where the lifeboat was able to get close enough in to confirm that there were no other casualties and that they were uninjured.

Sunderland Coastguard spoke to the girls one aged 10 and two aged 12 to offer safety advice and discovered that they not only had not bothered to check the tides but were unaware what the tides were and that the sea could cut them off. They also did not offer any reason as to why they had refused to listen to the Coastguard and Lifeboat crew when they were trying to get them to remain where they were so they could be safely evacuated.

Graham Dawson Watch Manager Humber said:

This could so easily have ended in tragedy, by failing to understand the tides the girls put themselves in danger and then by ignoring the advice from the Coastguard and lifeboat crew increased that danger leaving the Coastguard and lifeboat teams with no choice but to watch anxiously as they scrabbled around the rocks.

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