RNLI

This picture is of the Girvan lifeboat at her moorings. She's a 12 metre Mersey Class boat, the Silvia Burrell, with a range of 140 naultical miles and a top speed of 17 knots.



The UK lifeboat service is run by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, staffed mainly by volunteers and reliant on charity for funding - is this a peculiarly British tradition?

I urge you to use the link and visit their site - there can't be many of us who haven't been in some situation where we might have need their help - and see what they do and how they do it. You never know, you might just feel like donating something!