BRFM this week incidents from the HM Coastguard Sheppey
Written by karen on 28 March 2016
this week incidents from the HM Coastguard Sheppey
Thursday 24th
Sheppey CRT was paged at 1322hrs to attend Warden Point after a 999 call was received at Dover CGOC from a member of public stating a person was trapped in the mud.
Officers responding met with the casualty who was located approximately 100 metres past the end of the rock armour on the beach at Warden Bay and was up to her waist in the mud.
After initial attempts to free her were unsuccessful, Sheppey and Medway CRO’s, overseen by the Senior Coastal Operations Officer who had responded from Dover, had to resort to digging the female out by hand.
Access to the casualty was arduous due to the unstable ground around her and efforts were made to ensure that the stable ground wasn’t compromised allowing for safe extraction from the location.
After approximately 2 hours, the female was freed from the mud and was passed into the care of the ambulance service for a check-up.
The female was discharged from the scene with no concerns for her health from her ordeal, and all rescue personnel were stood down from the incident and returned to their respective stations.
Safety Point
The incident occurred because the female and her family were attempting to walk from the car park at Warden Bay to the WW2 blockhouse at Warden Point. Due to the state of the tide (close to HW) the path along the beach was inaccessible and they were walking along the area of recent cliff falls.
Due to the spell of reasonable weather recently, the mud has had a crust which has been baked, this crust gave way under her weight causing her to become trapped. Efforts were hampered by her struggling to self-rescue. This had an adverse effect and she sank further into the mud with every effort.
If any person is trapped in the mud, we would advise them not to struggle and attempt self-rescue, but to sit down and spread their weight as much as possible to reduce stress on a single point.
During the rescue, the female stated to Coastguard personnel that she had seen the warning signs but thought that the mud was only treacherous out to sea and that the path she was on was safe.
If any person finds themselves in difficulty around the coast, they are to dial 999 and ask for Coastguard.
Saturday 26th March at 1445
Tasked the Queenborough All Tide Landing to meet a broken down vessel called Ocean Blue. Two persons on-board. No medical assistance required.
supplied by HM Coastguard Sheppey
