Panic can paralyse. For nutritional therapist Julie Brooks (45), it struck during an activity she had completed many times before – walking from her holiday digs in Lydstep, Pembrokeshire, to Tenby. But this time, the tide came in quicker than she expected, and the weather took a swift turn for the worse.

Also out on the walk, on Thursday 4 November 2010, were Julie’s children Michael (17), Simon (11) and Caitlin (10). While the young ones went on ahead, looking in rock pools, Julie hurried along as the tide came in behind her. Running out of beach, the group found the rocks becoming steeper and more slippery, under a sky turning uglier by the minute.

‘Michael, a 6-footer, looked like he was struggling,’ Julie says, ‘but he helped the younger children on. That was when I started to feel the danger.’ Julie became frozen to the spot – too scared to go forward but with the incoming tide forbidding a retreat. ‘I could see the weather worsening, and it was getting dark. My body shut down; I felt sick and couldn’t move a muscle.’ She dialled 999.

Tenby’s all-weather lifeboat, the Tamar class Haydn Miller, was launched at 2.10pm into a force 6 wind and rough seas with a 1.5m swell.

Arriving at Lydstep Haven at 2.24pm, two crew members made their way to the cliff-face onboard the Tamar’s inflatable daughter Y boat (pictured). They climbed up to Julie’s position, and established that Michael had helped his younger siblings to safety. Julie recalls: ‘I had been standing on one foot, which had gone numb, holding on with one hand, with my phone in the other. The two guys got my ankles and walked me back to a safer spot. I said I didn’t mind jumping into the small boat, but they said it was too dangerous – I was shaking and already freezing.’

As the tide rose, the trio had to keep climbing beyond the water’s reach. They were to spend almost 2 hours together on the cliff-face that day. Julie says: ‘I was really frightened, but they tried to keep my spirits up. They were talking about how one of the crew had been called away from doing his shopping at Tesco for the shout, about volunteering, about being called away from work, and they kept me warm with a silver blanket.’

By now, conditions in the cove had got too rough for the little Y boat, with a 2.5m swell, so Tenby’s inshore lifeboat, the D class Georgina Taylor, was launched. It was even a little rough for this craft, whose crew had to request a partial escort to the scene from the bulkier Haydn Miller.

A member of the local Coastguard cliff rescue team came down on a rope to Julie, fitting her with a harness and lifejacket, with the intention of lowering her to the water’s edge and into the D class lifeboat. But as the sea state continued to worsen, it was decided to lift Julie by helicopter to the cliff-top and her waiting family.

She says: ‘Once I was up on the grassy ledge above, the coastguards checked my temperature and said to my husband: “She needs to go home and have a hot bath and a hot drink.” I was traumatised, and spent the night crying. I went down to Tenby Lifeboat Station the next day, still feeling fragile, but they were great. I wish it had never happened but remember the incident and its outcome with gratitude.’