From Stonehaven Lifeboat
Since qualifying last summer, new helm Jamie Longfield has been anticipating his first operational tasking. That came on Valentine’s day.
At around 6.30pm on Friday 14th February, Stonehaven RNLI was tasked by HM Coastguard to a ‘man overboard’ beacon near Aberdeen. Responding to their pagers volunteer crew abandoned their evening plans and launched Stonehaven RNLI’s Atlantic 85 the Jamie Hunter. They then headed north, to assist Aberdeen RNLI’s ALB and a coastguard fixed wing plane, which had also been tasked, to cover a search area of around 1500 square miles.
Stonehaven RNLI were tasked with searching the shoreline from Girdleness Lighthouse up to the mouth of the River Don and extending 2 nautical miles out to sea. The furthest north they have carried out search operations.
Jamie Longfield, Stonehaven RNLI Atlantic 85 helm, says: ‘The unfavourable weather conditions, darkness and being outwith our normal area of operations made this a challenging first operational tasking. But it’s good to get that first one under your belt, and our regular training sessions prepare you well. Of course you are never out there on your own. The Stonehaven volunteer crew are second to none.’
After a number of hours searching Stonehaven RNLI were stood down, HM Coastguard having determined the distress signal to have been a false alarm. The Jamie Hunter returned to station around 11.30pm and was washed down and put away by waiting volunteer shore crew.