Coxed four rescued from mud bank

Launch No: 283
Craft: Spirit of the Dart. D-702
Saturday, 1 April 2017
Location: Flat Owers. River Dart. Dittisham

A ladies coxed four from Manchester ran aground on the Flat Owers mud bank during the Head of the River race from Totnes to Dartmouth. The rowers remained safely in the boat and as they were very cold from the rain showers and there was still over an hour until low water the race officials requested the lifeboat volunteers to rescue them. A heaving line attached to a tow line was made fast to the boat which was some 25 metres from the water. The 50HP engine on the lifeboat could not move the boat until it was joined by a race safety RIB. The drop from the bank to the water would have broken the boat and at that stage the rowers and cox were lifted into the lifeboat and then transferred to the RIB to be taken to the Dartmouth Amateur Rowing Clubhouse. The inshore lifeboat towed the empty rowing boat.

Time

Request Received 3:10pm
Time at incident Deprecated: Implicit conversion from float 17683623.479166668 to int loses precision in /home/dartlifeboatorg/public_html/launches-detail.php (line 272) Deprecated: Implicit conversion from float 1061017408.75 to int loses precision in /home/dartlifeboatorg/public_html/launches-detail.php (line 273) 15 hour, 28 minutes
Back on Service 4:35pm

Conditions

Sea/River State River Calm
Wind Direction Southwest
Wind Strength 7-11 knots

Lifeboat Crew

Rich Eggleton (Helm)
Crispin Brabner
Haydn Glanvill

Shore Crew

Chris Tracey (Tractor Driver)

Deputy Launch Authority

Station address

RNLI Dart Lifeboat Station
Coronation Park
North Embankment
Dartmouth
Devon TQ6 9RR

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