Waste of recuers time

It's unclear from the article whether the people recovered the boat or not; if they had to swim to shore, they may have been in some degree of trouble, normally one just rights the boat and carries on, maybe in severe cases a breather on shore is required but that's usually a lot more hassle than it's worth.

If such things as loss of buoyancy integrity or hypothermia occur, it's a different ballgame and outside assistance may well be required.

Then again some rescue services have to justify budgets, so 'let's say we launched to another emergency' becomes a temptation...

A lot more to this story from several angles.
 
If they had been seen of our club on their own and capsized we would have tried to launch a rescue boat immediately. The reality in the sea that whilst most dinghies in reasonable conditions can self rescue, when they fail they need help fast. Waiting till they are really in trouble can result in death. The people on the shore were quite right as was the coastguard and lifeboat.
 
Some of the videos the RNLI themselves post concern me when they show lifeboats attending trivial breakdowns in sheltered waters in benign conditions.
 
When in the Rescue boat we have a simple rule - unless you can see the correct number of heads and an attempt to recover then it is an emergency.

Obviously slightly embelished as we generally know the racers so know their chances of capsizing and recovery... a frequent swimmer will not attract immediate attention were as others who don't and where there is little activity will be attended to more quickly.
 
Can't speak for this particular incident, but we often get fire service attending "our" jobs- reason is usually a 999 caller doesn't know about asking for Coastguard, and gets put through to fire and rescue. We don't share systems, and unless their call handler lets us know we don't know they're attending. Even then, normal practice is for them to roll to scene until its confirmed that it's the same job. Police attendance would probably be by the same route.

I have no problem with the type of call itself at all - member of public sees overturned boat and person in water, so calls us - right every time. You don't know their level of knowledge, so can't assume it's dinghy and normal.

I'd rather (and CG and RNLI crews would rather) deal with 9 false alarm / good intent than one body search from an ignored person in the water.
 
Some years ago my niece was out sailing in the bay in a fireball. She's an excellent sailor and had capsized several times pushing the boat to the limit on a breezy day. The last time there was an inshore rescue boat in the area doing training. They saw the capsize, raced over and insisted on rescuing her. She protested saying she did not want rescuing but they grabbed her by the lifejacket and hauled her onboard their rib. She was rightly p...d off!
 
I was once out diving, late in the evening and close to the fairway of a large port. Two of our divers where late surfacing (about ten minutes) and as it was nearly dusk we could not locate them easily. We where not concerned, good weather and nothing about and we knew they had torches so we where confident that as soon as it got darker we would easily spot them.

We contacted the coastguard on the VHF in case anyone else spotted them and thought it was more serious, informed them of the situation and our intentions (basically just wait).

After around thirty minutes, as expected we spotted there lights and picked them up, then contacted the coastguard to inform them that we had them safely on board and where proceeding back to our launch site.

To our surprise where told that the rescue services had been informed, that both the inshore and offshore lifeboats where being launched and a helicopter scrambled. Seconds later the inshore lifeboat appeared and (word for word) demanded we 'surrender our casualties' as they needed an emergency transfer to a re-compression chamber as this was a diving emergency. We pointed out that the only problem they had was earache from the rollicking they had just had for not surfacing on time!!!

This went on with the inshore lifeboat demanding that they take control, even after we pointed out the water was only 10mts deep so an decompression incident was out of the question. They insisted that they needed to be examined by an experienced diving medical officer. As it happened a BSAC medical examiner was on board with us.

We refused to hand them over so the inshore insisted that they would escort us to the launch site (sad really, we where a tad faster than them!).

On arrival we where greeted by a complete disco of blue lights with the police, coastguard, ambulance and fire brigade in attendance! Took a long time to sort out.

Over reaction I think!
 
Whilst I have every sympathy with those who are 'aggresively' rescued but these days I suspect the problem is that they are concerned quite rightly in case something does go wrong and grieving relatives are encouraged by the usual ambulance chasing lawyers to sue them for not doing their job. On the otherhand if they follow procedure they are cast iron against that form of litigation though perhaps you can try false imprisonment.

In general this sort of litigation is both costing us money on our insurance premiums and infringing more and more on our liberty.
 
My Daughter made me watch a program on TV earlier this evening. It was called Beach Rescue or something like like that. It was about a group of lifeguards in Sydney Australia, their over zealousness was quite hilarious.

Sign of the times I guess :confused:
 
daveyw said:
She protested saying she did not want rescuing but they grabbed her by the lifejacket and hauled her onboard their rib. She was rightly p...d off!
Click to expand...

Strictly speaking I think that's common assault. In her position I would certainly point that out to the "rescuers".

maxi77 said:
Whilst I have every sympathy with those who are 'aggresively' rescued but these days I suspect the problem is that they are concerned quite rightly in case something does go wrong and grieving relatives are encouraged by the usual ambulance chasing lawyers to sue them for not doing their job.
Click to expand...

Ambulance medics are very aware that they cannot treat or rescue someone against their will, and tend to be concerned about getting sued if they do so.

Pete
 
Nice stories about people getting rescued who didn't need it ... or coming close to it anyway ...

However - what if you've got someone who, in your opinion needs rescuing but is refusing to be rescued eg dinghy sailor over for the 10th time in 20 minutes and making no progress to a destination - I mean out of control capsizing - not just larking about - recovering from an accidental capsize can be very physically demanding and in the usually windy conditions they are likely to feel the cold quite quickly.... at what point can you remove them from the situation? (assuming you're in a rescue boat!)
 
fireball said:
at what point can you remove them from the situation?
Click to expand...

Assuming they're an adult and of sound mind (or at least, you have no defensible reason to think they might not be) and clearly express their wish that you not rescue them, I think in theory at least you'd be on dodgy ground to do so at any point.

In practice, if you did so anyway that doesn't mean you automatically end up in the dock the next morning.

Pete
 
Captain Ludd said:
My Daughter made me watch a program on TV earlier this evening. It was called Beach Rescue or something like like that. It was about a group of lifeguards in Sydney Australia, their over zealousness was quite hilarious.
Click to expand...

I spend a few hours watching some very shouty and aggressive behaviour from RNLI lifeguards at St Ives last summer. God help you, it seems, if you have the temerity to swim, surf or sailboard a single foot on teh wrong side of their cones - you'll get a yelling bloke in a quad bike harassing you within seconds.

prv said:
Ambulance medics are very aware that they cannot treat or rescue someone against their will, and tend to be concerned about getting sued if they do so.
Click to expand...

Two Ayrshire ambulance crew have just had their dismissals upheld after they locked a violent drunk into their ambulance for seventeen minutes after he attacked them so much that he did five months for it.

http://www.ayrshirepost.net/ayrshir...they-are-attacked-by-patient-102545-28842459/

fireball said:
However - what if you've got someone who, in your opinion needs rescuing but is refusing to be rescued eg dinghy sailor over for the 10th time in 20 minutes and making no progress to a destination - I mean out of control capsizing - not just larking about - recovering from an accidental capsize can be very physically demanding and in the usually windy conditions they are likely to feel the cold quite quickly.... at what point can you remove them from the situation? (assuming you're in a rescue boat!)
Click to expand...

When they agree, or when they are unconscious and cannot agree. It may be that police have statutory powers to deal with the situation otherwise, but lifeboat and rescue boat crews have no more official powers than any other hobbyist (in the nicest sense) who happens along.
 
Ubergeekian said:
Two Ayrshire ambulance crew have just had their dismissals upheld after they locked a violent drunk into their ambulance for seventeen minutes after he attacked them so much that he did five months for it.
Click to expand...

The newspaper story says they were sacked for recording her shouting, not for locking her in the ambulance which she got into willingly (after some persuasion). Presumably some boilerplate "data protection" policy about not recording patients, applied without any common sense by a mulish bureaucracy.

Either way, not really about treating someone against their will.

Pete
 
prv said:
The newspaper story says they were sacked for recording her shouting, not for locking her in the ambulance which she got into willingly (after some persuasion). Presumably some boilerplate "data protection" policy about not recording patients, applied without any common sense by a mulish bureaucracy.

Either way, not really about treating someone against their will.
Click to expand...

The Sun report - which is the one I saw in a cafe today - is rather different:

Julie ... said: "The finding stated I unnecessarily detained the patient in the ambulance for 17 minutes, and I undermined the trust between employer and employee."
Robert, who filmed the incident, was also axed for not stopping Julie from detaining Bennett.​
 
SeamanStaines said:
I was once out diving, late in the evening and close to the fairway of a large port. Two of our divers where late surfacing (about ten minutes) and as it was nearly dusk we could not locate them easily. We where not concerned, good weather and nothing about and we knew they had torches so we where confident that as soon as it got darker we would easily spot them.

We contacted the coastguard on the VHF in case anyone else spotted them and thought it was more serious, informed them of the situation and our intentions (basically just wait).

After around thirty minutes, as expected we spotted there lights and picked them up, then contacted the coastguard to inform them that we had them safely on board and where proceeding back to our launch site.

To our surprise where told that the rescue services had been informed, that both the inshore and offshore lifeboats where being launched and a helicopter scrambled. Seconds later the inshore lifeboat appeared and (word for word) demanded we 'surrender our casualties' as they needed an emergency transfer to a re-compression chamber as this was a diving emergency. We pointed out that the only problem they had was earache from the rollicking they had just had for not surfacing on time!!!

This went on with the inshore lifeboat demanding that they take control, even after we pointed out the water was only 10mts deep so an decompression incident was out of the question. They insisted that they needed to be examined by an experienced diving medical officer. As it happened a BSAC medical examiner was on board with us.

We refused to hand them over so the inshore insisted that they would escort us to the launch site (sad really, we where a tad faster than them!).

On arrival we where greeted by a complete disco of blue lights with the police, coastguard, ambulance and fire brigade in attendance! Took a long time to sort out.

Over reaction I think!
Click to expand...

As a diver i sort of understand that reaction by the emergency services but helicopter may be a bit extreme? Why do the cops need to come to these incidents?
 
prv said:
Assuming they're an adult and of sound mind (or at least, you have no defensible reason to think they might not be) and clearly express their wish that you not rescue them, I think in theory at least you'd be on dodgy ground to do so at any point.
Click to expand...

How would you establish "sound mind" then ... actions are sluggish, capsize frequency is high, destination is down-wind but up-tide and they're not able to head that way without capsizing, you can see they are cold and tired - not the best conditions for getting rational thought from anyone ...
 
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