The Aldeburgh Lifeboat
There are two lifeboats based in Aldeburgh, an inshore one and an offshore one, both manned by volunteer crews.
It is a tradition that on the main day of the annual
Aldeburgh Carnival
both boats are launched and joined by an Air Sea Rescue Helicopter
who meet up and perform various demonstrations to the crowds that gather on the beach.
Principal amongst this involves dropping some poor sod into the sea and showing various ways of retrieving them
and transferring them to and from the Lifeboat and Helicopter - thoroughly entertaining!
Aldeburgh Lifeboat Photos
Aldeburgh Lifeboat Official Website
About the RNLI
Funded by charitable donations, the lifeboat crews and lifeguards (The vast majority of RNLI people are volunteers!) of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution have saved over 146,000 lives at sea since 1824 (a figure that grows on average by 22 a day).
If you get the chance please help by either direct donation or purchasing RNLI merchandise!
The RNLI Website
The Aldeburgh Lifeboat Memorial
It should be remembered Lifeboats are manned by volunteer crews who risk their lives to save others and as well as their successes there is a tragic history of loss.
Aldeburgh Lifeboat is no exception which met with a disaster in 1899 that is commemorated by a monument in
the Graveyard at the Aldeburgh Parish Church of St Peter and St Paul which reads as follows:
On December 7th 1899, in Response to
Signals of Distress a Crew of 18 Brave
Men Manned the Lifeboat “Aldeburgh”
which was speedily Launched in the Teeth of
an Easterly Gale and a Heavy Rolling Sea.
At Duties call to Rescue others
with Their own Lives in Their Hands,
These Brave Men went Afloat when alas!
The Boat Capsizing Seven of Them Met Their
End and Lie Buried Here.
By a large Fund Promptly raised to Provide
for Those thus Suddenly Bereft, as well as
by the Monument, Fellow Townsmen and
Fellow-Countrymen Near and Far paid tribute
to an Example of Noble Self-Forgetfulness
|
