Skipper rescued from river and wife found in dory

The Dart inshore lifeboat was called at the request of the Coastguard after they had received a 999 call reporting cries for help coming from the river in the vicinity of the Noss Marina. A couple had been returning in their dory to their boat moored off Higher Noss Creek. Close to their boat the skipper fell in and the uncontrolled boat with his wife and dog on board continued up the river in the dark. The skipper was recovered by another yachtsman moored nearby, Jamie Hudson Bond, who searched for him in his tender and found him clinging to the bow rope of the skipper's yacht. By that time he had been in the 7 degree C. water for twenty minutes and was very cold. He took him to the Noss Marina where he was assessed by an ambulance crew and transferred to Torbay Hospital. The dory, with his wife on board, eventually hit the bank on the Kingswear side further upstream of the incident where she and the dog were located by the lifeboat crew and taken to the Noss Marina. Lifeboat crew; Buster Hart, helmsman. Yorkie Lomas and Steve Wallis, crew. Launch crew; Jim Brent, tractor driver. Mark Conroy, launch crew.