PEOPLE seeing lifeboats at sea for the first time have been heard to express surprise that they are so small. A lifeboat is indeed a small vessel. It has to be because a high proportion of rescues are carried out near rocks or sand banks where only a boat with a very shallow draught can operate. At many places too limitations on the size of the boat are imposed by the conditions under which she has to be launched.

The very size of lifeboats makes the selection of the equipment carried supremely important. Suggestions are often put forward for new items of equipment to be fitted in lifeboats, some of which might well on occasions be useful. But the rule which has to be applied is that every item carried must be simple to use, even in severe conditions, and necessary to ensure maximum efficiency in the boat's performance and her lifesaving capability. A former chairman of the RNLI, the late Earl Howe, used to propound the maxim that a lifeboat should not be turned into a Christmas tree.

The main purposes of lifeboat equipment are to help a lifeboat to reach a casualty; to allow survivors to be taken off or for the casualty to be taken in tow; to provide effective communications with other vessels or aircraft and with the shore; and to give protection to survivors and the crews themselves.

Some of the modern lifeboat's equipment is of traditional kind, whose value has been proved by long experience.

Such for example are the various ropes carried aboard. These include the towing and tripping lines for the drogue, which is itself a hooped canvas cone streamed from the stern of the boat to steady her when she is running before a sea. Another familiar item is the breeches buoy. For this to be brought into operation a line has to be fired from the lifeboat to the casualty. This is done by a 30 mm pistol firing 150yards of i-inch line, which acts as a link for sending the necessary equipment to the casualty. Once this line has been secured the lifeboat crew work the breeches buoy to and fro by means of veering lines. Lifeboats also have two securing ropes, a light heaving line to pass heavier ropes, and a line for use with a grapnel.

Made fast around the sides of thelifeboat are lifelines, which hang in bights to the water line, and a scrambling net. These are used for helping survivors out of the water. In addition there are coir fenders which are used to protect the side of the lifeboat when she comes alongside another vessel. Manilla, which was formerly used for ropes, has now largely been replaced by nylon or polypropylene, but for some purposes cordage of natural fibre is used.

The standard lifeboat anchor is the socalled 'Fisherman' type. It is attached by a few fathoms of chain to a 90-fathom nylon or wire cable.

The propellers of lifeboats are sometimes fouled by ropes, floating timber or other obstructions. In some classes of lifeboat a plug is fitted in the hull above each propeller which can be removed to allow a long handled cutting tool to be used to clear the obstruction. Lifeboats also carry boat hooks, two axes and marline spikes. Storm oil for helping to calm the seas around a casualty is also carried.

The engines by which lifeboats are driven are standard marine engines chosen as the most suitable for each particular type of lifeboat. The policy ofinstalling engines available on the commercial market was adopted in the1950s. Until then it was considered that there was no standard commercial engine available to meet the exacting requirements of the RNLI. This is no longer the case, and from the twin Caterpillar engines, each developing 375 brake hp at 2,200 revolutions per minute, fitted in the 52-foot Arun lifeboat, to the 40 hp Evinrude outboard engine in the smaller type of inshore lifeboat, various types of engine have been adopted.

Of the many reasons why the modern lifeboat is a more efficient vessel than those of earlier ages, none is perhaps more important than the improvement in communications. This was tragically illustrated in the year 1928, when the pulling and sailing lifeboat at Rye harbour in Sussex was launched with a crew of 17 in response to a message that a Latvian steamer was in danger.

Soon after the lifeboat had been launched it was learnt on shore that she was not needed. Signals recalling her were fired but they were evidently not heard, and the lifeboat continued on an unsuccessful search. As she neared the harbour mouth she capsized in a following sea. Every member of the crew was lost. One year later radio-telephony wasfitted for the first time in a lifeboat. It is not impossible that if the Rye harbour lifeboat had been so equipped the disaster would not have occurred.

The radio equipment in lifeboats has changed considerably in recent years.

Changes have been influenced not only by the development of new types of equipment but also because of the need to adapt lifeboat communications to those of other shipping, of H.M. Coastguard, of aircraft and of coast radio stations. By 1970 very high frequency (VHP) radio-telephony, which had been developing rapidly during the preceeding decade, had become the standard medium for communications between ship and ship and between ship and shore station within line of sight distance of each other. Today all conventional and inshore lifeboats are fitted with VHP radio.

Ultra high frequency radio-telephony was originally introduced to enable lifeboats and helicopters to communicate directly and was an important step in ensuring the close cooperation between these two types of recsue craft, which was perhaps the outstanding development in the improvement of rescue facilities at sea during the late 1950s and the 1960s. With the general adoption of VHP the need for UHF has diminished and no new UHF sets are now being fitted into lifeboats.

Radio communication is supplemented by more traditional forms of equipment, including signalling flares and a loud-hailer. Among the devices used is a parachute flare which can serve to illuminate a comparatively large area round a casualty.

The echo sounder, which enables a coxswain to know the exact depth of water below his boat, and the radio direction finder are among the items of electronic equipment. For some years after the invention of radar no sets were available suitable for use in a boat so low in the water as a lifeboat. Radar was first installed in a lifeboat in 1963, the boat being stationed at Yarmouth in the Isle of Wight. The cost of the set was largely paid for by a fund started by admirers of Joseph Conrad as a memorial to the great writer. The suggestion that such a fund should beraised was put forward by Conrad's son, John Conrad, who recalled that when, as a child, he was on holiday at the seaside, one of his father's first actions was to insist that the whole family visit the nearest lifeboat. Radar is now accepted as a standard item of equipment for conventional RNL1 lifeboats.

Some of the larger new lifeboats have additional navigational equipment such as a Decca navigator and an automatic pilot. Those of the 70-foot Clyde class, which can if necessary remain at sea for some days and which have full-time crews, have eating and cooking facilities.

These boats also carry on board a fast inflatable boat for rescue work close inshore.

The comprehensive first-aid kit carriedon board lifeboats includes pain killing drugs. A Neil Robertson stretcher is available for carrying injured people on to or off a lifeboat. Regular exercises are conducted with helicopters to perfect the technique of winching an injured man on a stretcher up into the helicopter from the deck of the lifeboat. Plastic or insulated sheets and blankets are used to protect survivors from cold.

There have been striking advances in recent years in the design and materials of the two piece protective clothing and lifejackets worn by all crew members.

Certain members of crews are also trained to carry out rescue work as swimmers, and special wet-suit swimming equipment has recently been developed.

All lifejackets are fitted with a whistle and a light. Reflective strips are also now being fitted. Anyone wearing an RNL1 lifejacket will automatically be brought face upwards in water. One man who undoubtedly owes his life to the fitting of a light on his lifejacket was Coxswain William Carter, who was washed overboard in November, 1966, when the Tecsmouth lifeboat was launched in a gale gusting to 90 knots.

The call was to go to the help of the crew of an oil rig. A very heavy sea rolled over the starboard quarter of the lifeboat as Coxswain Carter went out through the wheelhousc door. Almost as soon as he found himself in the water his lifebelt light ignited automatically. The crew carried out the drill for a man overboard with speed and success and Coxswain Carter was safely dragged on board. The lifeboat continued on her way to the oil rig.

Foodstuff's needed by crew and survivors on lengthy services include biscuits, corned beef, self heating soups, chocolate and brandy. Cigarettes are also carried. Many of those items are supplied to the RNLI free of charge by the manufacturers.

Electric kettles, cooking pots and cabin heaters are now fitted too into many lifeboats.

Plymouth's new lifeboat A new 44-foot steel lifeboat of the Waveney class is to be stationed at Plymouth. The lifeboat, which is being built at Messrs Groves & Guttridge's yards at East Cowes, is expected to take up operational duties at Plymouth in the Spring of 1974.

The naming ceremony of the new lifeboat is expected to take place during the International Lifeboat Exhibition which will be held in Plymouth for four weeks from July 20, 1974, as part of the celebrations of the 150th anniversary of the foundation of the RNLI.

The Waveney class lifeboats are based on a design of the United States Coast Guard. They are self-righting with a top speed of over 14 knots. Lifeboats of this class now cost rather more than £80,000..