A survivor's story Lifeboats in action is usually our opportunity to describe in thrilling detail how brave lifeboat crews save lives at sea - but what's it like to be rescued? Michael O'Connetl reports on his experience and thanks Salcombe lifeboat for coming to the rescueOne summer morning, a friend and I were steering Medina Maid 180 degrees 9 miles south of Salcombe, Devon, in a force 6-7 wind.

I heard a bang and the tiller went very light. The boat came onto about 120 degrees. I realised that we had lost steerage and saw the main section of rudder surface behind the boat. We were not in imminent danger, but we were now beam onto the swell, which was rolling the boat quite considerably.

I called Brixham Coastguard to report that we would attempt to turn the boat back towards our start point but that we would need some assistance as we would not be able to make much way into the weather. We then set about jury-rigging, a form of steering, by lashing a dinghy oar to the spinnaker pole.

Before contacting the Salcombe lifeboat Brixham Coastguard put out a call for anybody in the area to help, but they had no replies. Without the lifeboat we would have been on our own. Brixham advised us that Salcombe lifeboat had been launched and would call us direct, which they did within a few minutes.

The lifeboat radio operator was very calm and reassuring, which made both of us feel better and helped us to focus on the task at hand. He asked me to count slowly from one to 10 whilst transmitting.

This I did and they managed to pick up ourVHF signal with their DF [direction finding] equipment. I quickly worked out our latitude and longitude and relayed to them our position. They gave me an ETA of 8.30am, approx 45 minutes. We started preparing the boat for towing.

By this time the weather had worsened and I estimate the wind was at least mid 7s. The swell was rolling the boat severely and we were getting very wet and cold. Although we were still in control of our situation, we were both tired and being thrown about all over the boat.

The crew of the lifeboat called us several times during the time it took them to get to us, which was a great morale booster. It made us feel in contact with the rest of the world. When the orange and blue lifeboat came into sight it felt like the sun had just come out, although by this time it was pouring with rain. They radioed for us to take down the main sail and manoeuvred into position up wind of us to get a line across.

'When the orange and blue lifeboat came into sight it felt like the sun had just come out' The swell was severe, but they made it all seem so matter of fact. Their instructions were precise and clear. We managed to tie their line onto the bridle and they took us under tow, asking all the time if we were OK.

As we came into flat water in the entrance to Salcombe it was a great relief and we both offer our sincere thanks to a great bunch of guys who showed professionalism and courage going out into unknown situations just to help other people in need.ALL WEATHER LIFEBOAT Tyne class ON-1115 (47-012) Good Shepherd Relief fleet THE CREW Coxswain Marco Brimacombe Crew Members Richard Clayton; Andrew Harris; Christopher Puncher; Kevin Page; James Cooper; Richard Whitfield SALCOMBE LIFEBOAT STATION Established: 1869 RNLI Medals: Four Silver and nine Bronze THE CASUALTIES Crew of two on a sail yacht Medina Maid Date: 29 August 2003 THE CONDITIONS Weather: Overcast Visibility: Poor, less than 1 mile Wind: Force 7 Sea state: Rough, 2m swell.