What do you do when your boat starts to sink – so fast you don’t even have time to make a distress call? You hope there’s a lifeboat nearby …

It was a typical Sunday morning for the crew of Lowestoft lifeboat. A nice lie-in, a browse through the papers, then off out to sea at 10am for their regular training exercise.

But for the 11 people onboard the dive boat Storm Petrel, the afternoon’s events were anything but routine. Returning to harbour at 12.10pm, with a slight sea state and in force 4 winds, the 10m vessel was swamped by a couple of large waves and started to take on water. The crew desperately tried to bale out the ingress, but Storm Petrel was sinking fast – without even the time to put out a mayday call. It was high time for a stroke of luck.

As it happened, Lowestoft lifeboat was also returning to shore at the time, and the evervigilant crew spotted something awry. Coxswain John Fox says: ‘We actually saw the dive boat as it left, and as we were coming back we saw the boat again. It looked like he was coming in, but was in a bit of trouble. Next thing, it was down at the stern and they were baling out. We could see four of the guys in the wheelhouse, with their faces by the glass. They must have been terrified.’

Trapped
As the lifeboat approached, Storm Petrel went under, sternfirst.

The lifeboat crew shouted at those on deck, some of whom didn’t have lifejackets, to get off the vessel. Meanwhile, those trapped inside the wheelhouse struggled to escape. They managed to slide open a window under the water level, remove their lifejackets, dive down and swim out of the sinking boat.

The lifeboat crew used a lifebuoy, heaving line and Jason’s cradle (a device like a stiffened scramble net) to recover all 11 survivors from the choppy water. Once ashore, four had to be taken to hospital and treated for diesel ingestion.

John says: ‘I have been on the lifeboat for nearly 20 years and I have never had to rescue that many people in one go. I would like to pay tribute to my crew, who included trainees. Also, the guys in the water stayed calm and it seems their diver training helped them.

‘There was no mayday call – it was sheer luck that we were there at the time. If they had been further offshore it could have been a different story.’