|
Fishermen rescued in Penzance |
|
|
|
Thursday, 24 July 2008 |
Published: 24 July, 2008
Two fishermen have been rescued from a life raft, 20 miles off Penzance after their fishing vessel sank.
At 15.52 Falmouth Coastguard was contacted by RNLI Headquarters
reporting that the fishing vessel Levan Mor of Looe, which was fitted
with MOB Guardian, the RNLI's automatic position monitoring system,
had missed a scheduled report and that the vessel had last been
detected approximately 20 miles South of Penzance at 14.26.
Falmouth Coastguard immediately attempted to contact the vessel by
radio with no response and scrambled a Royal Navy rescue helicopter
from RNAS Culdrose and the Penlee RNLI lifeboat. Once on scene the
rescue helicopter spotted smoke and soon after, located a life raft
containing the two crew approximately 4 miles from their last
reported position. The men were winched on board and taken to
Treliske Hospital in Truro suffering from mild hypothermia. Their
vessel had sunk. The Penlee lifeboat subsequently recovered the life
raft and other debris.
The two men are from Looe and the Levan Mor of Looe, which is a 10
metre fishing vessel was working out of Newlyn. This incident has
been the first instance of the RNLI's new monitoring system raising
the alarm for a missing fishing vessel off the British mainland.
|
|
