At one stage three all-weather lifeboats – from Newlyn, Sennen and St Mary's – and a helicopter along with the Gry Maritha, The Scillonian and several other merchant vessels were involved in the search for eight boats.
The crews aboard the boats, who were training for the Woodvale Challenge – a series of ocean rowing races – got into difficulty on Saturday during a 30-mile row from Newlyn to the Isles of Scilly.
Ill-prepared
Coastguards said the rowers, some of whom were novices, were ill-prepared for the dangerous conditions and had ignored the advice of locals that it was unwise to embark on the trip.
The coastguards also said they had not been informed that the training session was going ahead.
Falmouth watch manager Andy Cattrell said: "It would have been good to know how many boats were out there but we only found out there were eight boats when we brought the first one in.
"Woodvale had a safety boat out there with the rowers but they had problems with their radio and lost track of the other rowers when they were helping us with the first boat.
"We normally have a good relationship with Woodvale and speak to them quite a bit but on this occasion we didn't know that the boats were out."
Just after 11am, Sennen's all weather RNLI lifeboat Norman Salvesen launched to assist the rowing boat Atlantic Adventurer, reporting a severely seasick person, near Porthcurno.
Seasick
Eventually the safety boat managed to tow the rowing boat into the relative safety of Porthgwarra Cove where the seasick casualty was transferred to the RNLI lifeboat.
The Norman Salvesen then towed the empty rowing boat back to Sennen Cove, while the safety boat attempted to join up with the remaining seven rowing boats. Meanwhile, the crew of another boat indicated that they were suffering badly from seasickness and wished to be brought ashore so the Sennen lifeboat immediately went to her aid, about four miles south of Land's End.
In a trickier operation, four persons were transferred to the lifeboat and taken back to Sennen Cove, arriving at approximately 2.30pm.
Rescue Helicopter 193 from RNAS Culdrose and the volunteers of Penlee and St Mary's RNLI lifeboats had now also been asked to account for the other six rowing boats.
In addition other vessels in the area including the Gry Maritha, and Scillonian III assisted in the search, and St Mary's coastguard cliff rescue team were asked to look out and record the arriving rowing boats.
St Mary's RNLI lifeboat towed one of the rowing boats back to the island and escorted four others. All the rowers and boats were finally accounted for by about 11pm.
Condemned
St Mary's RNLI operations manager John Nicholls strongly condemned what happened.
"One word sums it up – irresponsible," he said. "The rowers had been advised not to go and hadn't notified HM Coastguard when they did."
Simon Chalk (the Woodvale Challenge race organiser who was in the safety RIB) said that failure of the VHF equipment prevented communication with the various boats and the back-up was ineffective.
He said the Harbourmasters at both ends had been informed and he "presumed" HM Coastguard had also been advised. That this was not so, and why, would be very closely looked at he said.
Over the weekend the boats remained lashed together in a knot in St Mary's harbour. They were expected to return to the mainland later in the week aboard The Scillonian.
● A spokesman from the RNLI confirmed that each call-out of an all-weather lifeboat is estimated to cost £5,000 when training, maintenance and other costs are taken into account
article copyright THE CORNISHMAN
article link: http://www.thisiscornwall.co.uk/news/Irresponsible-actions-lead-scale-lifeboat-rescue/article-1289732-detail/article.html