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No-one who lived in West Cornwall then will ever forget December 20
1981.It was a Sunday, and as people turned on their radios or heard
from their family and friends that the Penlee Lifeboat had been lost
with all hands, a cold numbness spread through the whole community. It
seemed almost against nature. No Cornish lifeboat had been lost for
over 40 years and we were perhaps complacent with the usual pattern
that the lifeboats went out, rescued people, and came home again.
Suddenly the last piece of the jigsaw was missing, leaving a shocking
gap which still inspires a feeling of emptiness even 25 years later.
Those
closest to the tragedy really were in shock. The families, formerly
ordinary anonymous Mousehole people, were given no time to begin to
come to terms with their loss before they became the target of mass
national and international media.
Some were respectful but many
were brutally intrusive, leaving a bitter taste. Their dignified
response to this, and later to the controversies over the relief fund,
was a tribute to the families' strength and sanity in the face of a
world turned upside down.
Those left from the lifeboat's
operational crew were equally shattered. The lost crew were members of
their close-knit team, family, friends often from schooldays, drinking
companions, part of the very fabric of the village, suddenly gone along
with their boat.
Their response has gone down in history, though
it is typical of the spirit of lifeboat men and women everywhere. The
very next day, as the helicopters were quartering the seas outside the
harbour wall looking for bodies and wreckage, a new team were
volunteering and demanding a replacement lifeboat as a matter of
urgency. What if there was a vessel in trouble and there was no
lifeboat available to help?
As the press ballyhoo went on, a new
crew quietly got on with the job of retraining. Usually a crew grows
organically, the older ones teaching the younger, but this time the
cream of the station had gone overnight.
An RNLI team came to
Penlee to train the replacement crew, and within a couple of months the
station was completely operational once more. It was a huge
achievement, and proved for ever that a lifeboat station is neither a
building, a boat, or even a crew. It is an idea, and as long as that
idea is shared there will always be a Penlee Lifeboat.
And so
there is. In 1983 the station made a hard parting with Penlee Point in
order to accommodate the revolutionary Arun Class Mabel Alice in
Newlyn. She was designed to lie afloat rather than splash down a
slipway, and so took moorings in Newlyn harbour, where she remained for
the whole 20 years of her service.
Her first coxswain was Kenny
Thomas, and he was followed in 1992 by Neil Brockman, whose father
Nigel had been lost aboard the Solomon Browne.
At 28, Neil was
one of the youngest coxswains in the RNLI, and is now one of the most
experienced. He was even chosen to go to China to train the growing
Chinese lifeboat service on the Arun lifeboats they have acquired from
the RNLI.
The 25th anniversary finds the lifeboat station in
excellent heart In 2001 it was decided to add a fast-response inshore
lifeboat to Penlee's complement, and an inflatable Atlantic 75 Paul
Alexander now deals with the many smaller emergencies which naturally
arise on a crowded holiday coast - swimmers in trouble, inflatable
dinghies blowing out to sea, wind-surfers, jet skis, dinghies and
yachts in difficulties, even small fishing boats which might need a tow.
In
2003 she was joined by the state-of-the-art Severn Class Ivan Ellen,
designed to proceed at speed in all weathers to whatever mishap may
require her services. Despite the increasing work-load, only two
members of the Penlee station are full-time employees of the RNLI. All
the rest are volunteers, taking time out of their lives not only for
the service missions but also for the rigorous training now required,
exercises, demonstrations and routine work.
They are supported
by a network of shore-based volunteers, some acting as officers and
some performing astonishing feats of fund-raising. Despite having no
prominent retail outlet unlike some other stations, Penlee still
manages to raise around £50,000 every year towards RNLI funds.
Anniversaries of the tragedy are still difficult times, especially for the families who experience another wave of attention.
The
sadness of the event which touched and inspired the whole nation can
never fade, and its memory will always be painful. However the best
possible tribute to the brave boys who went out that night is the fact
that the station they served still exists, busier and more successful
every year, still dedicated as they were to the work of life-saving at
sea. The story of Penlee goes on.
For those wishing to know more
about the Penlee lifeboat disaster the BBC documentary The Cruel Sea is
to be repeated on Tuesday at 7pm on BBC2.
* Penlee - The Loss of
a Lifeboat and Penlee Lifeboat - the first 200 years by Michael
Sagar-Fenton are available from bookshops.
Article copyright THE CORNISHMAN
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