This summer has seen a magnificent increase in the funds raised locally for the RNLI and the Dart lifeboat in particular.

Dart RNLI has had plenty to celebrate recently, including a £14,181 donation from Mitch Tonks and diners at his Rockfish seafood restaurant in Dartmouth. This sum alone will cover nearly 40 per cent of the current year's overall operational running costs of the lifeboat station.

Rockfish has been open in Dartmouth for six years and the restaurant is next door to the more recently opened RNLI Visitor Centre on the South Embankment. Diners are asked if they would like to add £1 to their bill for the charity and Mitch Tonks then supplements this.

The other Rockfish restaurants are in Brixham, Torquay, Plymouth and most recently Exmouth. He
supports local community benefiting charities through each of them.

The celebrity chef has specified that £2,000 of the donation will be specifically set aside to help develop a new website for the lifeboat station. By this November, the station will have been operational for 10 years and the website sets out the history of the station and details of every one of the 300-or-so lifeboat launches.