The date - December 19, 1981 - is forever etched in the memory of Penwith folk.It was the day the Penlee lifeboat Solomon Browne foundered off Mousehole with the loss of all eight crewmen as she went to the rescue of the Union Star and her crew.

And now, exactly 25 years later, the regional and national media are revisiting Newlyn and Mousehole to mark the occasion with the RNLI opening the doors of the new Penlee boathouse in Newlyn harbour for radio and television.

South West press officer Tamsin Thomas said: "We have invited the media to look at how we run things now - there's been a lot of changes in the past 25 years. It is only natural that people will want to look back at what happened 25 years ago but we hope people will also get an idea of what goes on at a modern RNLI station."

Radio Cornwall are expected to air their breakfast show from the boathouse and BBC Spotlight and Westcountry TV will also broadcast from there during the day. Showing on BBC2 at 7pm on Tuesday will be a repeat of the documentary The Cruel Sea and John Craven's BBC Countryfile programme on Sunday will include a feature on Mousehole with a performance from the village's male voice choir.

Locally, as is now the annual custom, there will be a small act of commemoration during the Sunday service at Paul Church while on Tuesday, Mousehole's Christmas lights will be turned off for an hour.

In The Cornishman, three pages (31-33) are this week devoted to the tragedy with reflections on how it has affected the Penlee RNLI in the years since 1981 from their press officer Mike Sagar-Fenton, author of Penlee - The Loss of a Lifeboat.

There are also reminiscences from Douglas Williams, a reporter at the time, and a historical look back at the tragedy from Peter Waverly.

article copyright THE CORNISHMAN 

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