Graham Hall on Saving Lives at Sea

Thinking outside the box slightly, we established a new temporary Lifeboat Station on the spit of land at the entrance to Bembridge Harbour and they brought down virtually a readymade Lifeboat station. Three porta-cabins came down on the back of a lorry and were put there.

On the back of a lorry came a Mersey Class Lifeboat, which is a beach-launched Lifeboat, and a big tractor, a Talus tractor that could steam out into the water and we ran the Lifeboat there for over two years off the beach and this was, it was a magic time really.

This big tractor used to push the Lifeboat into the water on its trolley and when it was ready to float it used to drop its chains and the thing used to tilt and away the Lifeboat would go.

To come back it used to run itself up the sandy beach, just go straight onto the sandy beach, run up there until it was aground.

The Talus tractor which was an enormous great thing that was waterproofed, it could out into the water, it used to go out there, put a bridle on it and then pull it up the beach, go and get the trailer, bring the trailer round, put it next to the Lifeboat and then you could winch, the tractor, you could winch the Lifeboat back up onto the trailer and push it straight up into the compound with the thing where we had, which was left in the open all the time there and it worked extremely well.

We had a lot of fun with that, we enjoyed that time