It took 22 strapping volunteers one year and a lot of sweat, but East London’s National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI) now has five new jetties to make saving lives easier for the men and women of Station 7.
“The jetties were a big project and we have just finished them,” said Geoff McGregor, who has been the station commander for 13 years and who designed the new jetties.
“The old metal jetties were rusty and close to 25 years old and they were only 3m long, so we dismantled them and sold them as scrap.”
Material for the new wooden jetties and floater drums beneath was sourced from local businesses who donated supplies, while the station’s volunteers – five women and 17 men, including McGregor – sacrificed many weekends to get the work done.
This can-do attitude and willingness to roll up their sleeves and get stuck into not only heroic sea rescues but also the upkeep of their station, earned the station an excellence award at the annual NRSI awards ceremony held in Cape Town in June.
The new jetties are twice the length of the old ones and boast gangplanks wide enough to carry rescued people on stretchers or trauma boards.
McGregor said the project saved “an arm and a leg” and was simply an extension of the housework volunteers attend to at the station.
“We do our own Brasso-ing, cut our own grass, clean our own bathrooms. We have no gardener or housekeeper. We are them.”
The station responded to 22 calls in the first half of this year, 75% of which consisted of medevacs off international ships.
He said the station’s riskiest and most dramatic rescue of the past year took place when the Llama Lo catamaran was hit by a whale and sank off Port St Johns.
French skipper Jean Sitruk and Capetonian crew member Lyle Castelyn drifted in a rubber duck off Kidds Beach and were eventually rescued by a ship.
“We spent 13 hours in huge swell looking for them and at one stage were 172km off shore which is the furthest we’ve been out,” said McGregor.
Giving some background to the excellent station awards, NSRI national operations manager Brett Ayres said all 35 of the country’s stations were visited and evaluated for key criteria every year.
“We look at things like station leadership, operational effectiveness, how good the station’s training plan is, how many call-outs and rescues it performs and the impact on the community.”
Ayres said stations scoring 75% and higher received station excellence awards and that more than 20 were awarded this year.
McGregor said the station’s next project would be to enlarge the station’s control room and that volunteers would pitch in once again.
lThe station will hold an open day on Saturday, November 19. — barbarah@dispatch.co.za
EL NSRI proves excellence with new jetties
“The jetties were a big project and we have just finished them,” said Geoff McGregor, who has been the station commander for 13 years and who designed the new jetties.
“The old metal jetties were rusty and close to 25 years old and they were only 3m long, so we dismantled them and sold them as scrap.”
Material for the new wooden jetties and floater drums beneath was sourced from local businesses who donated supplies, while the station’s volunteers – five women and 17 men, including McGregor – sacrificed many weekends to get the work done.
This can-do attitude and willingness to roll up their sleeves and get stuck into not only heroic sea rescues but also the upkeep of their station, earned the station an excellence award at the annual NRSI awards ceremony held in Cape Town in June.
The new jetties are twice the length of the old ones and boast gangplanks wide enough to carry rescued people on stretchers or trauma boards.
McGregor said the project saved “an arm and a leg” and was simply an extension of the housework volunteers attend to at the station.
“We do our own Brasso-ing, cut our own grass, clean our own bathrooms. We have no gardener or housekeeper. We are them.”
The station responded to 22 calls in the first half of this year, 75% of which consisted of medevacs off international ships.
He said the station’s riskiest and most dramatic rescue of the past year took place when the Llama Lo catamaran was hit by a whale and sank off Port St Johns.
French skipper Jean Sitruk and Capetonian crew member Lyle Castelyn drifted in a rubber duck off Kidds Beach and were eventually rescued by a ship.
“We spent 13 hours in huge swell looking for them and at one stage were 172km off shore which is the furthest we’ve been out,” said McGregor.
Giving some background to the excellent station awards, NSRI national operations manager Brett Ayres said all 35 of the country’s stations were visited and evaluated for key criteria every year.
“We look at things like station leadership, operational effectiveness, how good the station’s training plan is, how many call-outs and rescues it performs and the impact on the community.”
Ayres said stations scoring 75% and higher received station excellence awards and that more than 20 were awarded this year.
McGregor said the station’s next project would be to enlarge the station’s control room and that volunteers would pitch in once again.
lThe station will hold an open day on Saturday, November 19. — barbarah@dispatch.co.za
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