Mayday! Lifeboat heroes in epic nine-hour rescue
LIFEBOAT crews battled 35ft waves and gale force winds in a ninehour operation to rescue six fishermen.
The men were stranded after their creel boat, Sparkling Line, broke down off the north coast of Sutherland on Thursday.
Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) volunteers from Thurso, Caithness, endured gale force eight winds in their attempt to reach the fishermen.
The efforts of the lifeboat crew were also hampered by squalls of hail, sleet and rain during the two-hour journey to get to the vessel, which was drifting north of the remote uninhabited island of Eilean nan Ron.
The RNLI crew then faced a struggle as they tried to attach a towline to the boat. The rope is said to have been wrenched from the fishing vessel five times in heavy seas.
However, the craft was eventually towed to Scrabster harbour around 10pm.
Shetland Coastguard was alerted by the Scrabster-based Sparkling Line’s crew at midday.
The creel boat had broken down after its propeller was fouled and the craft began drifting towards the shore.
A Shetland Coastguard spokesman said: ‘The crew were strapped into their seats from the start for what was to be a rough, bumpy passage west along the north coast.
‘The boat was two-and-a-half miles north of Eilean nan Ron when the lifeboat arrived on the scene just before 2pm.
‘After being at sea for nine hours and 30 minutes the lifeboat took the casualty alongside at Scrabster harbour.
‘The crew then refuelled the lifeboat and made her ready for service again by 10.10pm.’
Deputy coxswain Andy Pearson said the towing operation had been among the toughest callouts the Thurso crew had been involved in.
He added: ‘Breaking waves were coming over the top of the
deck, which were then washing the tow rope about.
‘So you are trying not to keep a lot of loose rope on the deck, otherwise it gets wrapped round your feet.’
Coxswain on the lifeboat was Dougie Munro, who recently received his 40-year service medal from the RNLI.
Mr Munro’s older brother, Bill ‘Wing’ Munro, retired as Thurso’s coxswain last month after almost 48 years’ service.
Between them the brothers have clocked up nearly a century of service to Thurso Lifeboat and have received multiple awards over the years for their rescues.
They and their crew were recognised for their bravery in the rescue of a scallop boat in extreme weather in September 1997.