Stornoway, Outer Hebrides - At 12.45 p.m. on 29th January, 1967, the coastguard informed the honorary secretary that the motor fishing vessel Margaret Sinclair was long overdue on a passage from Stornoway to Castlebay. The lifeboat The James and Margaret Boyd slipped her moorings at 1.5 in a gale force south easterly wind and a rough sea. It was four hours after high water. A few minutes later the coastguard reported that the vessel had been sighted at the mouth of Loch Shell, about 16 miles south of Stornoway.

She was drifting, with her machinery apparently out of action. The life-boat arrived alongside the Margaret Sinclair at 3.10 and towed her back to Stornoway harbour. She arrived back on station at 7.15..