One morning last May an army ambulance stuck in the sands at New Brighton, Cheshire, and two other vehicles which went to drag it out also stuck.

The tide was coming in, with" a nasty swell, and the need was so urgent that there was no time to launch the life-boat. Instead one of the mechanics and a life-boatm?n went to the rescue in the motor boarding boat. They had a mile to go. When they reached the vehicles they found three men in them. Two were submerged to their armpits. The third had only his head above water. In five minutes they would have been drowned..