Lowestoft, Suffolk. At 8.32 on the morning of the 5th of December, 1960, the coastguard informed the honorary secretary that the trawler Pradnik of Gdynia, Poland, was signalling for immediate medical assistance. There was a fresh south-westerly wind and a choppy sea. The tide was flooding.

At nine o'clock the life-boat Michael Stephens was launched with a doctor on board. She made for the agreed point of rendezvous between seven and eight miles south-east of Lowestoft, but a message was received that the trawler was further south, and the life-boat met her four miles east of Southwold. The doctor was put on board to attend one of the trawler's crew, who had been scalded after a steam pipe had burst.

First aid had been rendered by the skipper. After the man had been treated the trawler made for Great Yarmouth.

The life-boat returned to her station at 11.45..