When a cargo ship lost power and started drifting towards danger, two lifeboat crews headed out on a rescue that would test their endurance to the limit ‘It’s an unusual coincidence,' says Padstow Mechanic Mike England, ‘that for the past 2 years, we’ve had an interesting shout in rough weather on almost exactly the same day at the end of January.’ And this year, on 30 January, the lifeboat crew completed their hat trick. The MV Verity, a 91m cargo ship carrying 3,000 tonnes of scrap metal, lost power to its engines, 25 miles offshore and began drifting towards the jagged rocks at Hartland Point. Teaming up, Appledore and Padstow lifeboat crews went out to rescue it and – in a rather unusual turn of events – ended up enlisting the help of a Dutch naval warship. At 11pm on the night on 29 January, Falmouth Coastguard requested the launch of Appledore’s all-weather lifeboat Mollie Hunt. Twenty-five miles west of Bude Haven, the MV Verity was adrift in a near gale and heavy seas. At the mercy of the sea, the vessel was slowly being pushed towards the jagged rocks at Hartland Point. Although the engineer aboard the Verity was attempting to repair the engine, the Appledore crew knew that, if the engineer couldn’t fix the engine, they were going to need help. However, with wildly unpredictable tides near Appledore, there was the very real possibility that, when called upon, they wouldn’t be able to launch. Rather than risk leaving the Verity in danger, the crew decided to take no chances and head out to Bideford Bay overnight, to be near the vessel if
anything went wrong while the tide was out. Appledore Second Coxswain Owen Atkinson says: ‘If you’ve ever tried to sleep on a lifeboat, you’ll know that it’s not the most comfortable of places! One of us had the floor, the other two were squeezed into the relative comfort of the casualty cabin – but in those situations, you don’t really sleep anyway, because your senses are heightened and you’re constantly alert. You can cat nap and switch off though, and charge your batteries a bit before the shout.’ The next morning, back on land at Padstow Lifeboat Station, Alan Tarby was monitoring the situation. Knowing the situation was continuing to look worse, he called the Coastguard and convinced them to launch the Spirit
of Padstow too – in these seas and with a vessel of that size, two lifeboats were going to be better than one. Once they reached the vessel, Padstow checked in with Appledore and they began to work out how to keep the vessel from drifting onto the jagged rocks at Hartland Point. They were now 8 miles from shore – drifting at a rate of 2 miles an hour – and the tug wasn’t due to arrive for over 12 hours. If they didn’t act quickly and prevent the vessel from drifting,it was going to be in trouble. Owen recalls: ‘Between us and Padstow, we came up with the idea to have, essentially, a daisy-chain– with a lifeboat towing a lifeboat towing the vessel, which was an interesting idea; it’s something that none of us have ever done or seen before.’ Once the daisy chain was established, the two crews tried to turn the bow of the boat. That way, if it drifted further ashore, it would avoid hitting Hartland Point. ‘We’d never done or practised it before,’ recalls Alan. ‘But it worked first time. It was actually even more effective than we thought – we’d asked the skipper to get his engine running [although the boat was stranded, the engine could run and give thrust for around 20 minutes before it cut out] to give us a bit more power and initially assumed that his engine was responsible for turning the boat. After we’d turned it around though, we heard him over the radio say: “Shall I start my engine yet?” It turned out that the two little lifeboats had turned this 5,000-tonne boat out of harm’s way!’ However, by this stage, the three vessels were just 3 miles off the coast. Towing the vessel and its 3,000 tonnes of scrap metal wasn’t an option – all the lifeboats could do was to hold it, stop it from drifting and hope that a tug arrived soon. Luckily, a Dutch warship was nearby and responded to a call for help from the Coastguard, arriving on scene in the nick of time. After a few practice runs, the warship attached a tow rope and began to tow them to safety. Kevin Dowle, Captain of the Verity, remembers this moment well: ‘Each of those three runs took around 30 minutes, and by the time they got the rope aboard, we were getting dangerously close to the rocks. It was getting a bit touch and go. If those boys hadn’t held us until it’d arrived, I dread to think how it could have gone – they gave us a bit of breathing time to get everything sorted. If they hadn’t, I think we’d have lost the old girl on the rocks.’ Luckily, now the tow had been attached, the crew aboard Appledore’s Mollie Hunt could return to shore and make a crew change. After 17 hours of being thrown around by a rough sea, they were all tired, exhausted and feeling a little worse-for-wear. Volunteers at Clovelly Lifeboat Station had heard the news too and had arranged for the Appledore crews to change over at Clovelly and use their kit. They’d also prepared hot food and drinks for the crew when they returned from their long shout. Martin Cox, the Coxswain at Appledore, was on leave, but had been monitoring the situation. Knowing he’d probably be needed to relieve the crew, he’d pulled together a team who had
just come back from a training course and told them to meet at Clovelly. The relief crew took it in turns to sleep as they waited by the vessel, staying in position until the tug arrived to pull the Verity to safety. The lifeboat was finally stood down, but Martin and his crew had to wait for the tide to turn before they could return to Appledore. As Martin says: ‘We didn’t have the most difficult job to do, but after 17 hours of standing by and escorting duties – especially when the lads had been away on a course all week and had got straight back on the boat without returning home – we were all ready for bed!’
Words: Jack Barclay
Photos: RNLI/(Padstow, Nigel Millard,
Nathan Williams)

‘ We are so very grateful’
This letter from Faversham Ships Ltd was received by Padstow lifeboat crew:
‘To the Coxswain and Crew, Padstow lifeboat. Many thanks for the incredible assistance given to our MV Verity yesterday, pleased to say the ship is just waiting to berth safely in Swansea for engine repairs. The calm, professional and very humbling assistance given by yourselves and the Appledore lifeboat have been fundamental to this. We now understand what the true traditions of the RNLI mean and are so very grateful.’
‘Thank you again.’