Misleading article.

[ribrunt]

...Thanks to whoever posted the PDF - really interesting.....

.....Was it Southend where they used a million pound hydraulic davit to do a job that was previously performed by a rope and tackle? .....

PDF was in my first post ... And while I agree with much of the sentiment expressed by various posters, I would like to correct obvious misrepresentations. We have the same davit that they use at Southend. Cost esimate £150k - same as a tractor and less maintenance. Also, it does not do the same job - it is a certified man-riding davit whereby earlier davits did not permit crew on board for launching, resulting in longer launch times & increased risk to crew climbing up / down ladders.

I think we are all agreed that the publication of some annual report on those near-misses (lives saved/prolonged/etc) might be of use. like I said earlier....I'll ask the question.

@Rib_Imposter - the RNLI would likely bother because they are continuously trying to reduce incidents as previously noted. If this helps, then.....

@Chris Robb - plenty of threads on the French model vs RNLI - not going to even go there in my response as I think it is not helpful to the discussion at hand!

 

[RIB_imposter]

I'm pretty sure nobody is criticising the RNLI's published statistics. Unless you think 'a bit more detail would be nice' is critical.

As for agendas... that's laughable.

Actually I think people were criticising them - which is why to some extent I defended them. If you look back you will see people questioning (criticising) the possibility of saving 300 lives at sea. The basis for that criticism seems to be (a) I've not personally scrutinised every case to decide if the live was actually saved therefore I don't believe it and (b) an erroneous cross comparison between yachting fatality statistics and the RNLI "total lives saved" data.

I hightlighted that I had looked at local incidents over serveral years and was confident that lives saved really would have been lost without RNLI or similar intervention. Likewise I highlighted that comparing total lives saved by lifeboats to lives lost on yachts was a nonsense but thread/argument drift seem to preclude people on here saying "I'm mistaken, or hadn't realised that".

If the RNLI spend in total say 1 man week documenting (say 20 words per incident) all the 300 odds lives they save, is that big loss? A volunteer could do it at zero cost - christ - Id do it for nothing.

I think you'll find you already have that sort of level of detail at the rnli, and that is covers more than just the lives saved incidents. I am sure that they would be delighted to have you volunteer for them for a week - so get in touch either with your local station or the HQ. Still not sure what your expecting to find that isn't so obvious anyway, but you think can be captured in 20 words.

 

[RIB_imposter]

@Rib_Imposter - the RNLI would likely bother because they are continuously trying to reduce incidents as previously noted. If this helps, then.....

Ribrunt - I agree - but without the statistics I can tell you the things that will save more lives / reduce their workload. And do you know what they're rather similar to the things the RNLI sea safety guys bang on about. Maybe they based that list on their statistics - or maybe its just common sense / good seamanship / years of experience etc.

 

[Tranona]

Of course I realise that! The point that I am making is that there is a very big gap between actual lives lost (even if you include lives lost not related to yachts) and lives saved with very little information to explain what happened in what must be a quite large (but not unmanageable) number of incidents. I don't doubt your confidence - just the lack of concrete evidence to support it.

Your "list" of causes is obvious - however it is not based on firm evidence, nor are we able to tell, for example, whether the impact of better lifejackets has had an effect on the number of drownings. Nobody seems to ask those questions in anything other than a general way. As the rescue services (all of them, not just RNLI) are the only source of such data, it is not unreasonable to ask for it. However, as we have seen all the services only report numbers in a way that suits their requirements - and those of their funders.

 

[RIB_imposter]

Of course I realise that! The point that I am making is that there is a very big gap between actual lives lost (even if you include lives lost not related to yachts) and lives saved

really? I can't find easily any reliable stats for number of lives lost at sea each year - but RoSPA suggest that in 2005 there were over 600 drownings - now I realise that no all of them were in waters covered by the RNLI. Equally however drowning is not the only cause of death at sea. So say there are 1000 people each year who find themselves in a genuinely life threatening predicament at sea, half are rescued (by RNLI / helo / other vessel) and half don't survive. Is that implausible. Actually I would see it as no more or less plausible than say 80% surviving (very good rescue services, with very good means of getting help) to only 20% surviving (help doesn't get called / arrive quick enough in most cases).

with very little information to explain what happened in what must be a quite large (but not unmanageable) number of incidents.

just because they have collated / summarised the information - don't assume that they have very little information.

I don't doubt your confidence - just the lack of concrete evidence to support it.

OK here are some of the local examples that make me believe that when the RNLI say they saved a life they do actually mean that without them they believe the life would probably have been lost:

Lives Saved: 3

The lifeboat crew were called to the aid of 3 people in the water following the capsize of their speedboat off Wemyss Castle. A fourth person had managed to swim ashore to raise the alarm.

The lifeboat crew located the people in the water, clinging to the hull of the speedboat. None of them were wearing lifejackets, but one was holding on to one.

The crew managed to pull all three people from the water in time, and they were transferred ashore to Dysart harbour, to waiting ambulance crews and local coastguard teams.

Lives Saved: 2

The lifeboat was called to the aid of two people in difficulties off Inchkeith Island. One person was in a canoe and one on a surfboard - both unable to make it back ashore against the wind and tide. The lifeboat crew took the surfer and board onto the lifeboat and escorted the canoest back to Kinghorn.

Lives Saved: 1

Lifeboat crew were called to a woman in the water off Kirkcaldy. The crew found her about 50m offshore in an apparent suicide attempt, recovered her to the lifeboat and took her to awaiting ambulance and coastguard personnel

Lives Saved: 3

The lifeboat was called to help a small speedboat off Burntisland, which had broken down. When 2 minutes from the scene, the crew were told that the boat had sunk and there were 3 people in the water. The speedboat crew had no lifejackets on, so were in danger of drowning.

As the lifeboat approached the scene, one of the speedboat crew activated a personal flare, so the lifeboat crew could locate them more easily. They were taken ashore before the lifeboat returned to pull the sunken speedboat ashore.

Whats more revealing is when they don't claim to have saved a life... but with 50+ shouts a year it would take a lot of space.

Your "list" of causes is obvious - however it is not based on firm evidence,

I don't need firm evidence. I have common sense. If using my common sense I avoid or control a very small insignificant risk I don't care. I am open to learning about new risks - but just because we have been effectively mananaging the worst risks for decades, and they don't make it to significant statistics anymore doesn't mean that I should ignore them.

.nor are we able to tell, for example, whether the impact of better lifejackets has had an effect on the number of drownings.

Not sure what you mean by "better lifejackets" but i'll assume you mean hoods, leg straps, lights. How many incidents you think there have been in the last few years (since such things became more popular) where (1) a person has ended up in the water (2) the person would have been wearing a "better lifejacket" and (3) a lifeboat made it to them? Not enough to draw any statistically meaningful conclusions. How do I know this? You can tell from the stats that very few calls are in high seas at night far from shore to the sort of vessels where these "better lifejackets" are starting to gain acceptance. Also bear in mind that stats can be misleading - its quite feasible to see a reduction in drownings from a better lifejacket but an increase in hypothermia fatalities - because you lived long enough to freeze to death! But lets not go off at another tangent.

Poorly equipped inexperienced people in unsuitable boats are the main cause of their call outs. Analyse the data as much as you want - but when 80% of the events are caused by highly predictable reasons any unusual causes won't stand out from the noise.

You keep missing the point:

When lives are lost or nearly lost in circumstances that seem surprising (e.g. Ouzo - experienced crew, on relatively routine trip, in suitable boat with the right equipement and people on board wearing lifejackets; loch lomond rib accident - experienced skipper on "percieved" safe water for a short family trip) the MAIB investigates and shares the "new knowledge". The RNLI don't need to do that for us - because the MAIB do - and do it more detail than you could reasonably expect the RNLI to.

However, as we have seen all the services only report numbers in a way that suits their requirements - and those of their funders.

doesn't seem at all unreasonable to me. Other than internal planning / organisational reasons - the main reason for reporting this info is to shout from the rooftops - look at all the great work we do - help us keep doing it.

I'll make this my last post on the subject as I am obviously banging my head against a brick wall - who believes there are very few incidents of the type that are relevant to "him" (less than 10 fatalities a year) but that the RNLI are hiding huge amounts of useful information, and that most of the people the RNLI saved (not assisted) would have lived anyway.

 

[RIB_imposter]

I have just read the article (author not named) "Lifeboat rescue missions increase" on page 7 of the November issue of YM.

It lists the number of lifeboat launches From 1st June to 31st August in the years from 2003 to 2009. However it only compares year 2009 with 2008 and says rightly that there has been a increase of 156. Admittedly this does give a more sensational headline and no-one wants to give a false impression of the excellent work that the RNLI does in saving life but the author should give a complete picture of the statistics.

He studiously avoids mentioning the reduction in rescues from 2006 to the present! The real picture is that from 2003 to 2009 there is no statistical increase or reduction in lifeboat launches in the summer months.

I know I said I wasn't going to comment further but I thought I would bring us back on topic.

A few years a go I went to a "workshop" on P.R. I couldn't understand why they were so obsessed with numbers and stats - even if there was no real credibility to them. But Journos (and possibly the public) love them. Its much easier to right an article saying X% increase in call outs or Y lives saved etc than it is to right some waffle about the lifeboats with no real "facts" (used in the loosest sense possible). in there.

I was obsessed with ensuring that the press releases I wrote would stand up to scrutiny, with credible and genuinely justifiable statistics. The lady running the course asked me, "do you believe everything thats written by a journalist?". "No, of course not", I replied. "Are your customers not equally as able to interpret/filter what they read as you?" she responded. "So whats the point on an article with statistics or numbers which noone cares about or believes in?", I said smugly believing I was winning the argument. She crushingly put me back in my place, and it all became clear, "Thats not the point of the article! The purpose of the article [from your perspective] is to get your company/product/service in the media with people talking about it. The purpose of the statistic is simply to make the journo's life that little bit easier - and stop him completely buggering up by printing something you didn't want!"

So it makes no difference to you/me/YM/RNLI whether there were 156 more rescues or not, nor whether that is just noise or a real increase. What matters is that YM published an article about how busy the RNLI were. Therefore the reader is reminded of the importance of the service and subconsciously encouraged to donate. If he also thinks - I don't want to be part of that increasing trend and checks his engine/sea cocks etc to reduce the chance of a call out then that is a bonus. But imparting facts onto you was not the aim of the article.

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

Actually I think people were criticising them - which is why to some extent I defended them. If you look back you will see people questioning (criticising) the possibility of saving 300 lives at sea. The basis for that criticism seems to be (a) I've not personally scrutinised every case to decide if the live was actually saved therefore I don't believe it and (b) an erroneous cross comparison between yachting fatality statistics and the RNLI "total lives saved" data.

ROTFLMAO! To turn a 'question' into a 'critisism' you've actually had to write in "criticising" in brackets!

I certainly question the possibility of knowing that 300 lives were saved, but it's no critisism. I just wish to know. It doesn't seem unreasonable. (Of course there's significant evidence in this thread that the RNLI *understate* the number of lives saved.)

I know first hand the difficulty of guessing if you've saved someones life. I once helped fish three guys out of freezing water in Feburary - potential survival time 30mins-1hr??? Two were hospitalized. I can't imagine that any other vessel would have come past that day. I still can't honestly say I saved their lives and I would have thought the RNLI would face a similar problem.

 

[RIB_imposter]

I know first hand the difficulty of guessing if you've saved someones life. I once helped fish three guys out of freezing water in Feburary - potential survival time 30mins-1hr??? Two were hospitalized. I can't imagine that any other vessel would have come past that day. I still can't honestly say I saved their lives and I would have thought the RNLI would face a similar problem.

I think thats fairly simple you saved their lives. Here's my thinking and why I don't believe its that hard for the RNLI to apply the same principle reasonably objectively.

-- In the absense of a third partly (you, the RNLI, or a helo or another seafarer etc) taking positive action would the person have died? i.e. the person was unable to rescue themeselves. Therefore their lives were saved.

the question you are asking yourself is would someone else have saved them - not if they were saved. The fact that you saved them is simply a matter of fact having established the former. The "subjective" question is when is towing someone in saving them (I guess its when there is insufficient time/conditions for that person to have organised a commercial tow before they would have run into difficulties which could have resulted in loss of life - e.g a lee shore in F8 with the anchor dragging, or maybe even midchannel with no lights/electrics...) But actually it doesn't matter where you draw the line - so long as every tow is not reported as lives saved and a line is drawn somewhere and applied consistently it makes no real difference to our understanding.

 

[Tranona]

Yes, it is probably time to call a halt. Sorry you seem to see me as a brick wall. Nothing could be further from the truth. My concern is that huge amounts of useful data is hidden by the choices made about the way the events are reported. The figure of approx 10 deaths a year related to leisure craft is real. Given that in the RNLI stats nearly 50% of launches are related to leisure craft. Are 50% of the "lives saved" also related to leisure craft? Within that the split is 50/50 roughly power and sail. Does that affect the nature of the incidents? The fact that we do not know and cannot find out is concerning. This is just one example of what one poster called the "bikini" effect.

All I am suggesting is that you might open your eyes to the possibility (no reality) that important, useful information is lost through the choice in the way that incidents are described and recorded.

If it is any consolation, it is not a problem that is unique to this subject. We see it all about us every day. I get back to my truism - "a way of seeing is a way of not seeing". You see the same things as me, but you see them in a different way, and this also denies you the way of seeing it differently. So, I can see that it is perfectly valid to report in the way that is currently used, but it is denying the opportunity to learn lessons.

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

the question you are asking yourself is would someone else have saved them - not if they were saved.

Spot on. Self rescue was not an option - but would someone else have come along? I can never be sure... ...and it pisses me off, I want to look in the mirror and see a "life saver" not a "possible life saver"!!!

But actually it doesn't matter where you draw the line - so long as every tow is not reported as lives saved and a line is drawn somewhere and applied consistently it makes no real difference to our understanding.

I almost agree. I'd say it doesn't matter where you draw the line, as long as the examples are available to understand where that line is. Now the RNLI have no obligation to make their terms more transparent, but if they did it I believe it would be better for everyone because we could all learn from it. Which is where we came in.

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

I'll make this my last post on the subject as I am obviously banging my head against a brick wall - who believes there are very few incidents of the type that are relevant to "him" (less than 10 fatalities a year) but that the RNLI are hiding huge amounts of useful information, and that most of the people the RNLI saved (not assisted) would have lived anyway.

Nobody is saying that the RNLI 'hide' information. That's an emotive reworking of the suggesting that more information would perhaps be good. I'd have thought that was impossible to dispute.

Nobody is saying that the people the RNLI saved would have lived anyway.

The fact is we just don't know and would like to be able to better judge. You're misrepresenting "asking for evidence" as "disputing the data". It's not.

 

[RIB_imposter]

Yes, it is probably time to call a halt. Sorry you seem to see me as a brick wall. Nothing could be further from the truth. My concern is that huge amounts of useful data is hidden by the choices made about the way the events are reported.

concern is quite a dramatic word! But I have already said earlier that they must have this data and could present it easily enough. But thats not really going to give you the "root cause" information you were calling for earlier. I much more open to sharing data that they already collect and classify - rather than seeing the the RNLI innevitably getting into pointing the finger of blame.

The figure of approx 10 deaths a year related to leisure craft is real.

I suspect it relates to sailing (wind powered) rather than all pleasure boats?

Given that in the RNLI stats nearly 50% of launches are related to leisure craft. Are 50% of the "lives saved" also related to leisure craft? Within that the split is 50/50 roughly power and sail. Does that affect the nature of the incidents?

i'll tell you my gut feel based on the local incidents that I have read through the circumstances of and seen how they classified their recording (this is interesting but not actually useful): no the %age of lives saved does not correspond to the %age of call outs to specific type of craft, i.e. 25% of callouts are to sailing boats, but 25% of lives saved will not come from sailing boats. e.g. I think there are a large number of suicide attempts which skew the data. My gut feel is also that when fishing boats sink/get in trouble they often do so in poor weather far from home with several people on board - so (if there is a successful outcome) a single incident can easily result in a 4 or 5 lives saved. I would also guess that the %age of lives saved on Mobo's is heavily skewed towards small boats which always seem to sink with lots of people on board and few lifejackets! As far as I can see if your on a boat and that boats not on fire, sinking fast or otherwise a "wish I bought a liferaft moment" then you're not going to be classed as a life saved - just assisted. Innevitably that must mean pleasure boaters have a smaller %age lives saved.

All I am suggesting is that you might open your eyes to the possibility (no reality) that important, useful information is lost through the choice in the way that incidents are described and recorded.

I guess what I am disputing is the emphasis on the words I highlighted in bold.

A cynic might wonder if the stats you are looking for, but the RNLI don't routinely publish perhaps paint a picture that doesn't suit there needs? How could that be - well lets assume that their main donors are middle class boat owners (I have no idea if this is the case). If the stats suggest that yachtsmen are rarely being saved by the RNLI but "chavs" jumping off cliffs, playing see how many we can fit in a 1970's fletcher or letting their kids float off on lilos - then perhaps the current donors may not be so keen.

 

[Tranona]

Well, I will make a couple more comments - although just fimishing packing for a couple of weeks sailing round the Ionian so will be the last!

Pleased to see that some of your comments are addressing my "concerns". The gut feelings you have about the distribution of serious incidents is the same as mine. For example, not one seagoing MOBO has foundered with loss of life over the last 10 years. However, MOBOs account for roughly 25% of callouts. We simply don't have the information to make sense of what is really happening. Nearly all your examples were small speedboats - lumped in with MOBOs in the "stats". More lives are lost among yachties from incidents related to using a dinghy to get to a yacht than any other cause - but you really need to dig to find that out.

Another good subject for a long and emotive thread here is whether there should be a licence to operate a yacht. All the major bodies such as the RYA and RNLI are against this - however, there is no reported evidence that lack of competence is a factor (or not) in life threatening incidents.

The frustrating thing is that all the information is there - it is just not reported in a useful form to help individuals make their own choices on how they deal with risks, nor to aid policy makers in formulating legislation or regulation (if needed).

My own view (probably shared by you) is that leisure boating is a very low risk, safe activity and the major risk areas are both few and obvious. However, this gets lost in the blanket headline "statistics" - never mind the facile comments that follow them as shown in the news report that triggered this off!

Food for thought!

 

[toad_oftoadhall]

A cynic might wonder if the stats you are looking for, but the RNLI don't routinely publish perhaps paint a picture that doesn't suit there needs? How could that be - well lets assume that their main donors are middle class boat owners (I have no idea if this is the case). If the stats suggest that yachtsmen are rarely being saved by the RNLI but "chavs" jumping off cliffs, playing see how many we can fit in a 1970's fletcher or letting their kids float off on lilos - then perhaps the current donors may not be so keen.

Possible.

For instance take Tenby this year. Would yachtsmen and wealthy widows want to contribute to a beach life saving charity? Aren't there a lot of other people who would like to contribute to a beach patrol charity if they knew one existed?

I thought this incident also highlighted a good example of the uncertainty of what "lives saved" means. The BBC reported 40 "lives saved" and their RNLI interviewee didn't correct the term.

None of the local old salts I spoke to thought these 40 people were in the slightest of danger. (A death toll of zero backs this up.)

Now was the "lives saved" misreporting? Or were they really listed as "lives saved". And if the RNLI deem the 40 lives to have been saved then more detail would be greatly helpful in the local area because it's pretty clear the locals just don't appreciate the 'danger' that they live with day to day.

However you look at it more information is good.



Lets not forget garifs:
http://www.gafirs.org.uk/