MARCH 25TH. - WHITBY, YORKSHIRE.

At 10.55 in the morning the coastguard telephoned that an aeroplane had come down in the sea one mile off Sandsend and that her crew had taken to their rubber dinghy. All the fishing boats were at sea, and the lifeboat’s coxswain, second-coxswain and crew were out with them, but the motor-mechanic and the winchman quickly got together a crew. Ex-coxswain Thomas W. Welham, 71 years old, who had retired from the life-boat over six years before, took command, with T. Peart, aged 60, as acting second-coxswain, and the other six members of the crew were the motor-mechanic himself and five boys, sixteen years old. At 11.5, ten minutes after the call had been received, the motor lifeboat Mary Ann Hepworth was launched.

There were patches of fog, but the life-boat soon found a coloured patch in the water.

Shortly afterwards she found the rubber dinghy itself, with four airmen on board, about half a mile off Sandsend. The aeroplaneaeroplane had sunk. One of the airmen had hurt his leg, and all four had cuts, mostly about the head. The life-boat brought them in at once, arriving at 11.50. The station was thanked by the Director General of Aircraft Safety, by the pilot of the aeroplane and by his aerodrome. - Rewards, £7 6s. 6d..