FOUR LIFE-BOATS IN SEARCH OF A YACHT Padstow, Cornwall, Clovelly, Appledore, and Dfracombe, Devon.—On the llth of November, 1947, the motor yacht Ocean Spray, with a crew of two men and a woman, ran«into very bad weather off the north coast of Cornwall ' while on passage from Milford to Littlehampton. Her engine broke down off Trevose Head and she sig- nalled for help. The signal was seen by the Trevose Head coastguard and passed to Padstow at 3.40 in the after- noon, and at 4.23 the No. 1 motor life- boat Princess Mary was launched.

A strong south-westerly wind was blowing, with a moderately rough sea.

The life-boat found the yacht with S.S. Cranborne standing by. They declined the life-boat's help and the Cranborne took the yacht in tow. The life-boat then returned to her station, arriving at 6 o'clock the same evening.

The steamer and the yacht were re- ported later by the coastguard at Hartland Point to have passed up channel at 10.40 bound for Swansea.

At twenty minutes after midnight the Cranborne reported that she was four miles north-east of Hartland Point, that the tow-rope had parted and that she had lost the yacht. This informa- tion was sent by the Hartland Point coastguard to the Clovelly life-boat station, and at ten minutes to one in the morning of the 12th the motor life boat City of Nottingham was launched.

On the way down the beaeh—it was low water—she hit a stone and damaged her bottom. The gale was now blowing strongly from the west and the .sea .was rough. The life-boat spoke the Cranborne and was directed by her to a position between Lundy Island and Hartland Point. The coxswain now found that his damaged life-boat was leaking, and went under the shelter of the land to investigate. He pumped out the water and continued his search for the yacht, but the water that had come in had put his wireless out of action, so he returned to Clovelly for information. Here he learned that the yacht's crew had been rescued by the Appledore life-boat.

The information from the Cranborne which had been passed to Clovelly by the Hartland Point coastguard had been passed also by the Croyde coast- guard to Appledore, and the motor life-boat Violet Armstrong had put out at 1.12. She made a hazardous, but successful, crossing of the bar, and just before four o'clock found the yacht, disabled and waterlogged, ten miles east of Hartland Point. She attempted to take the yacht in tow, but the rope parted. At a second attempt another rope was lost, and then, with great difficulty, the life-boat rescued the woman and the two men, and leaving the yacht to drift made for Clovelly.

Here she landed the three rescued pe< pie. Owing to the heavy surf on Appledore Bar she waited until after- noon before she returned to her station.

On her way she searched for the Ocean Spray, and found her wrecked OP the sands at Woolacombe in Morte Bay.

She reached her station at 4.30.

The life-boat station at Ilfracombe had been kept informed of what was happening and at 2.25 in the morning the motor life-boat Richard Silver Oliver was launched to search the Bull Point area in case the missing yacht should have drifted there with the flood tide and south-westerly wind. When it was learnt that the crew of the yacht had been saved the life-boat was recalled and got back to her station at 6.10 in the morning.—Rewards. Padstow, £5 16s.; Clovelly, £31 18s.; Appledore, £39 10s. 6d.; and Ilfracombe, £29 15s.