'Emergency Rescue: Air, Land & Sea' behind the scenes: meet the coastguard team

In Sunday’s episode of ‘Emergency Rescue: Air, Land & Sea’, we saw Porthoustock Coastguard Rescue Team working together with the Newquay search and rescue helicopter crew to help a man who got well and truly stuck in dense gorse.   

The man decided to climb the cliff as a short cut to escape an incoming tide, the gorse gradually got thicker and denser to the point where he was completely stuck.   

Rob Farr, Senior Coastal Operations Officer, was at another incident nearby when the call for help came in. Rob said:

"I was with Falmouth Coastguard Rescue Team at an ordnance incident a few miles away, it was all under control so myself and a member of the Falmouth team headed over to the cliff incident. 
 
"That stretch of cliff is well known to us, people often get caught out by the tide, attempt to climb to the top and more often than not get into difficulty.   

"When I arrived the Porthoustock Coastguard Rescue Team were already on scene. Andy, a coastguard rescue officer, was attempting to crawl though the gorse to the man but it proved just too dense. The back-up plan was to call the helicopter for help and thankfully they were able to lift the man out of the gorse.

"Sometimes one little decision can have a massive impact on your day. The man was very lucky that he only came away with a few cuts a bruises from the gorse, it could have been a lot worse." 


Senior Coastal Operations Officer Rob Farr 

If you’re heading out for a walk along the coast, check the weather and tides before you head out. Take a fully charged mobile phone and tell someone where you are going and when you will be back. And remember don’t attempt to climb a cliff as a short cut to the top! If you do get into difficulty or see someone in trouble at sea or along the coast call 999 and ask for the Coastguard. 
  
You can catch up on ‘Emergency Rescue: Air, Land & Sea’ here. 

Don’t forget this week’s brand new episode on Sunday at 9pm on More4.  

Popular posts from this blog

Label your kit at the coast

Image
Kayaks. Canoes. Paddleboards. What do they all have in common? They’re quite often found on the coastline or drifting out to sea. And if we don’t know who they belong to, we can spend time searching for an owner when they’re home safe and sound. So please help us to help you. Label your kit so that if you do get separated from it, and it turns up somewhere, we can get hold of you. In recent weeks, our Coastguard Rescue Teams have found numerous items such as kayaks and canoes drifting out at sea or abandoned near the shoreline. Unfortunately, some of the items we have found have not had their owners’ contact details written on them nor been reported as missing to the Coastguard. As a result, it makes it difficult for us to find out who it belongs to and also means we can never be completely sure if someone is safe or in the worst case, in trouble at sea. This can place a huge strain on our resources especially during the busy summer period when we have to call upon our Coastgua
Read more

A short history of HM Coastguard

Image
Today HM Coastguard is a world leader in maritime search and rescue. Looking back almost 200 years, the goods, which now travel by road, were carried by hundreds of small ships. Year in year out dozens of ships and hundreds of lives were lost within sight of the coast. Public shock and dismay at the tragedies drove forward the creation of national life saving organisations. Though it’s beginnings lie in those decades HM Coastguard originated not to meet the dangers of the seas but to combat a threat to the country’s economy and security – smuggling. As soon as medieval taxes were charged on imports and exports, people began smuggling. By 1743 th e estimate was that half the tea drunk in Britain was illegally imported and shows that smuggling was highly profitable. Smugglers have often been romanticised but the reality was brutal. Local people lived in fear, with violent reprisals on informers and the murder of revenue officers, while corruption enabled smugglers to evade harsh p
Read more

BOSCASTLE FLOODS: TEN YEARS ON

Image
Boscastle Flooding 16 th August 2004 The storms of Monday 16 August 2004 saw three weeks worth of rain fall in one day. The resulting water began to be funnelled down the valleys surrounding Boscastle and soon the steep roads became rivers. By the time that the water reached the picturesque village, it had picked up enough momentum to become a raging torrent, sweeping into buildings, washing cars away and felling huge trees. Graham King runs the Witches Museum in Boscastle and was also the station officer for the Boscastle Coastguard Rescue Team at the time of the floods: “ My museum is situated next to the harbour near the river ,” says Graham “ and I can see the coastguard equipment store from there. Initially I was concerned that the vehicle and equipment were going to become stranded but I soon began to realise how quickly the situation was deteriorating and called Falmouth Coastguard ” From that point on the villagers and tourists stranded in flood waters were he
Read more