The inshore lifeboat and four volunteer crewmembers launched at 3.55pm on Monday and were alongside the South Pier casualty within a few minutes. The casualty was extracted by stretcher onto the inshore lifeboat and brought back to the Ferry Road lifeboat station to waiting paramedics.
Later that day, Hartlepool RNLI was asked to help four people who were struggling in the water at Crimdon Dene. The Hartlepool RNLI inshore lifeboat ‘Solihull’ and all-weather lifeboat, John Sharp, launched to attend the incident. On arrival at the scene, the inshore lifeboat crew recovered a person from the water who had swallowed a lot of seawater and was very cold. The casualty was taken back to the Hartlepool RNLI lifeboat station, where paramedics were waiting to deal with him. The other three people had managed to make their own way to the beach.
Hartlepool RNLI lifeboat operations manager Steve Pounder said: “Good communications between ourselves, Coastguard, fire service and the ambulance service brought the incident to a safe conclusion. It’s been a busy week for the volunteers whose commitment to the charity has been outstanding.”
