Tidal Thames - vhf procedure for person in river

[Wjj]

I’ve been wondering what the sensible thing to do is if you spot someone in the river / someone fall into the river while out on the tideway. In particular how to call for help. I’ve done the src and have the rya radio book and from that it seems like the official process is to call a mayday relay on channel 16 but there’s a good minute of reading out my mmsi number etc. The procedures seem to make more sense at sea when help is further away and there might be more doubt about your exact location. Would it make more sense just to call London coastguard and say what you’ve seen? Or do a dsc urgency call so your lat and long comes up on someone’s control screen? Or perhaps to call London Vts on 14 that’s the one most boats will be listening to? Anyone in the water would presumably appreciate seeing the tower lifeboat sooner rather than later

 

[dunedin]

Call on channel 16. Include your boat name and location - Lat Long PLUS a succinct verbal description of the location.

Dont bother phaffing about with with Call Sign or MMSI until established contact and Coastguard can assess urgency of the situation,
If they want it they can ask later, but even then many boats the details are below and if lack spare crew skipper can simply saw not available. This worked for me when acting as first responder on a live Mayday and rescue. Never did waste time with MMSI.

 

[Wjj]

Would you make a mayday relay - which has to be a voice call but is technically the right call for someone else in distress - or a dsc mayday or panpan, both of which transmit location information automatically? For a location I can see that “50m upstream of tower pier” or something is likely to me more quickly understood than lat and long so is a useful addition

 

[Pump-Out]

Mayday on Chanel 14.
Give location relative to a significant landmark.

London VTS will initially pick up the call as lead.
Police, fire and RNLI all monitor 14, as do all the professional trippers, workboats, tugs and some pier masters.

I acknowledge that's not what the RYA guidelines say, but it's the way London Tideway works.
The only people who won't be listening are the rowing coaches.

 

[Wjj]

Mayday on Chanel 14.
Give location relative to a significant landmark.

London VTS will initially pick up the call as lead.
Police, fire and RNLI all monitor 14, as do all the professional trippers, workboats, tugs and some pier masters.

I acknowledge that's not what the RYA guidelines say, but it's the way London Tideway works.
The only people who won't be listening are the rowing coaches.

This is more what I was expecting. this seems like the fastest way for some help to be on the way. It also seems more in keeping with the radio traffic in the area

 

[TwoFish]

Include your boat name and location - Lat Long PLUS a succinct verbal description of the location.

Dont bother phaffing about with with Call Sign or MMSI until established contact and Coastguard can assess urgency of the situation,
If they want it they can ask later, but even then many boats the details are below and if lack spare crew skipper can simply saw not available. This worked for me when acting as first responder on a live Mayday and rescue. Never did waste time with MMSI.

At least for the upper reaches of the Tidal Thames (I don't know about the wide bit down at the Gravesend end), if there's a person in the water, the succinct verbal description (e.g. "100 yards downstream of Eel Pie Island") is far more important than Lat and Long. That's what the lifeboat will get from HMCG and few if any recreational boaters will follow coordinates. Once you've got the initial Mayday Relay (or 999 call) out, a What3Words reference can also be useful information for any shoreside responders, should a casualty need to be attended to / evacuated.

 

[STOL71]

London VTS is on Channel 14 up until Crayfordness, west from there it’s Channel 68 and in the estuary 69

 

[Time Out]

Just call 999 and ask for coastguard. They will action the lifeboats. Talking ‘upper ish ‘ regions of tidal Thames

 

[harvey38]

Lift the cover, press the DSC distress button, select MOB from the drop down menu and standby on Channel 16.

 

[Pump-Out]

Just call 999 and ask for coastguard. They will action the lifeboats. Talking ‘upper ish ‘ regions of tidal Thames

And how, exactly, would that notify all the other craft in the area?

A MoB in the vicinity of the bridges is best attended by all available boats. More than once have I been able to maintain an immediate look-out for a person in the water as a result of the initial call on Chan 14.

Tide runs of 7 knots through the bridges soon move your casualty.

 

[Time Out]

And how, exactly, would that notify all the other craft in the area?

A MoB in the vicinity of the bridges is best attended by all available boats. More than once have I been able to maintain an immediate look-out for a person in the water as a result of the initial call on Chan 14.

Tide runs of 7 knots through the bridges soon move your casualty.

I'm very aware of all of that but the advice is to call the coastguard in the first instance, in fact, its almost rammed down your throat in my cruising area ( Teddington) but agreed you should also broadcast on 14, personally, I would do this AFTER I have alerted the coastguard.

 

[oldgit]

Primary response would be attempt to recover the casuality ( if practical or possible) and to remain with the casuality in order to make it easier for rescue craft to find them while calling everybody and anybody for assistance on other channels
We always monitor 14 or whatever channel is required to be monitored in the lower Thames.
Have always been amazed at the number of craft ( mainly yachts but the odd gin palace) which fail to have a listening radio watch while underway.
Have frequently heard London VTS calling assorted boats regarding various transgressions and failing to get any sort of response especially around the Barrier.
We did on one occasion in the upper Medway remain on station with our boat until a recovery team were able to get to the scene.
In this case a fast urgent response would have been pointless.

 

[PeterBoater]

London Coastguard is co-located with London VTS at Woolwich, so a call to one, I think preferably VTS on Ch 14 because other vesssels will be monitoring it, will alert the other straight away. Any RYA advice to call the CG in the first instance does not take account of the realities of VTS areas. The parallel situation in aviation is to declare an emergency or urgency on the frequency one is on, not change to the emergency frequency.
Incidentally, the building that houses London VTS (Ch 14) and London CG also houses the Environment Agency who control the Thames Barrier, so it's a one-stop shop. The other VTS channels are at Gravesend.

 

[Lower Limit 1909]

"I’ve been wondering what the sensible thing to do is if you spot someone in the river / someone fall into the river while out on the tideway. In particular how to call for help."

On each of the 4-5 occasions I've been in this situation for real (all on the upper tidal Brentford - Teddington) it hasn't occured to me to use any radio or telephone communications. Some of those occasions pre-dated DSC or were when only equipped with a handheld on the upper tidal and very unlikely to reach London VTS or anybody else). On each occasion I've headed to the casualty/casualties (on one occasion 5 in the water from an upturned hire rowing boat) and recovered them. In all cases - situation resolved in 3-4 minutes.

RYA PB MOB procedures teach prioritising 'solving the problem' over 'communicating it'. (Finding the reading glasses, hitting the DSC MOB button, scrolling through the menu, can seem to take an age when you can instead be 'on scene' in 1 minute and chucking a throw line) or better.

That said, if not solo, then at least one other SOB on board will have been shown how to use the DSC button (mostly just in case it's me that goes over). Had I been equipped to realistically do so at the time, then on at least 3 of those occasions I would have called for a DSC auto call or attempted to do it myself.

My personal priorities ...

(1) Locate, track, and recover.
(2) Hit the auto DSC MOB button. Ideally done by a SOB who has been briefed on how to do this. I wouldn't hesitate on this. Easy to cancel if (1) works out
(3) Mayday to London VTS on CH 14 (above Dagenham / Crayfordness). 68 or 69 below depending on where you are.
(4) Enlist any nearby suitable craft to assist by shouting, waving, and pointing. (worked for me on 2 occasions).

The specifics of the situation:

- Numbers in the water
- Numbers on recovering boat able to assist
- Suitability of vessel for ease of recovery (swim platform, manouverability, etc.)
- The current and proximity of hazards
- The nature of the MOB (kayaker with buoyancy vest or a more vulnerable casualty).

will of course quickly determine the viability of doing (1) and whether to jump straight to both (2) & (3) or indeed (4).

 

[Time Out]

Okay just throwing this out there. And NOT saying it’s correct…. But the majority of calls for persons in the water from Tedd to Chiswick ( for ease) are from people on land. Their only means of alerting the services is via a mobile and asking for coastguard. That’s what they are actively encouraged to do.

I’ve only ever recovered (by boat) down to Richmond and never needed to alert emergency services or thought about it as I tried to resolve then situation and recover myself.

I guess it only really applies below say Hammersmith? Even if you monitor Chiswick lifeboat for overturned rowing crews etc the calls have mostly come from phones.

Perhaps the difference lies between a simple recovery and significant danger to life. Yes I know they all are a danger to life but there are variables.

A person drifting past tower bridge will probably need more resources thrown at the rescue that a person floating past EelPie at Twick ?

But there should of course be correct procedure regardless of rescue. Whether this is OTT can only really be the call of the person dealing with the situation.

 

[oldgit]

Simply having the subject raised and debated might encourage those most likely to encounter this situation to have a think about their reactions.
Any resulting plan , however sketchy, can only be a positive.
Having a life ring or lifeline handy which can be quickly and easily used might help ? especially in the fast flowing waters found between Teddington and the Barrier.
Did have look at the horse shoes on my boat recently, it would taken at least a few minutes to release from their holders and untangle the recovery lines.
Its lot easier to approach somebody in the lower reaches due to depth and width of river and the fact both boat and casuality will be probably moving at the same rate.

 

[TwoFish]

Having a life ring or lifeline handy which can be quickly and easily used might help ? especially in the fast flowing waters found between Teddington and the Barrier.

At the risk of thread drift, kayak-style throw bags are well worth considering:

What's the best design for a throw line.

 

[Wjj]

Primary response would be attempt to recover the casuality ( if practical or possible) and to remain with the casuality in order to make it easier for rescue craft to find them while calling everybody and anybody for assistance on other channels

I can easily see that there are cases where the best thing is simply to fish someone out yourself. But equally that it's quite easy to imagine a situation where realistically it'd be better to get help. e.g. imagine someone falling in near Tower Pier in the middle of the day with plenty of river traffic out and a fast tide running - for the sake of this example that no one else has noticed. My 22 Meter, 90 year old dutch barge might not be able to get to the casualty particularly quickly against the tide - and we're not the easiest vessel to recover someone on to. So it might make sense for us to throw a life ring / line to the casualty (we do carry these) if they're near enough, and to try to head in their direction, but it may also be that a Thames Clipper with its massive water jets can get there quicker and hang on to them better than us. Then to actually get someone out of the water is easier from a rib or a police boat or similar, if there happens to be one nearby. It feels a little irresponsible to say that someone else should help, but also I wouldn't want to be a well meaning wally getting in the way and making things worse. For this reasons it seems to make sense to let other vessels and the authorities aware on ch14 pretty quickly, but not before throwing a life buoy.

 

[PeterWright]

Mayday on Chanel 14.
Give location relative to a significant landmark.

London VTS will initially pick up the call as lead.
Police, fire and RNLI all monitor 14, as do all the professional trippers, workboats, tugs and some pier masters.

I acknowledge that's not what the RYA guidelines say, but it's the way London Tideway works.
The only people who won't be listening are the rowing coaches.

That surprises me. I assume London VTS, like any other VTS, monitors channel 16 as well as there own working channel, so why not use the specified channel for a Mayday call - you'll get through to London VTS just as quickly and you can also be sure that the CG and the RNLI are monitoring channel 16. RNLI boats launch when tasked by HMCG, so they are the ones you need to get to first.

Peter.

 

[Portland Billy]

The majority of other vessels on the river will be monitoring 14. and probably no dual watch, other vessels are the likely first responders depending on location.
I would go for ch14