We've saved 108 migrants from boats in distress.. we are proud to do our duty

THE Royal National Lifeboat Institution has revealed its crews saved the lives of 108 migrants crossing to the UK from France last year.

- MATT ROPER  

It is the first time it has published figures for the work its brave volunteers do in the Channel.

Its lifeboats launched 290 times in 2022 to attend incidents involving men, women and children making the perilous journey across one of the world's busiest shipping lanes in what it describes as "small, overcrowded and unseaworthy boats".

They represent just 3% of its total 9,312 launches around the UK and Ireland last year. But the 108 lives make up more than a quarter of the 389 people saved by lifeboat crews last year.

The RNLI has faced criticism for acting as a migrant "taxi service" but in a strongly worded statement chief executive Mark Dowie said his organisation will not waver in its mission.

He explained: "We have never released these figures before but they illustrate clearly that our work in the Channel is genuinely life-saving.

"The RNLI is unashamed and makes no apology for staying committed to the purpose we were created for, nearly 200 years ago - to save lives at sea.

The Mirror yesterday joined three RNLI lifeboats on a training exercise nearly two miles off the coast of Poole in Dorset, where volunteer teams staged rescues with new equipment.

We watched as a lifeboat ploughed through the choppy waters of the English Channel towards a group of five people in the open sea.

The crew tossed small fluorescent yellow packages which inflated on impact with the water to become lifebuoys. Then, as the boat came closer, an inflatable staircase was lowered into the sea allowing them to be calmly helped to safety.

The "rescue" demonstrated the RNLI's latest specially developed gear to rescue multiple casualties, such as overturned, overcrowded dinghies.