St Helena Bay latest base to receive JetRIB

A newly formed satellite station to the NSRI’s Mykonos base on the West Coast recently received its very first JetRIB, a ground-breaking vessel that will boost rescue capacity in the area.

Station 44 (St Helena Bay) is the latest station to receive a JetRIB in the NSRI’s drive to roll out a fleet of 58 of these ground-breaking vessels. The JetRib was funded by Santam and is named Spirit of Santam II.

While not yet a fully-fledged station – it falls under the command of Nic Stevens, who heads up the well-established Mykonos base (Station 4) nearby – St Helena Bay is well on its way to providing much needed rescue capacity in the area, with a view to becoming an independently run station some time in the future.

“Station 44 is growing well,” says Nic. “We qualified our first four rescue crew in December, bringing the total crew to 10 active volunteers and four qualified crew. A few more trainees will soon qualify as well.”

Thanks to the ‘semigration’ phenomenon and more people working remotely in the aftermath of the pandemic, the residential population along the West Coast has grown significantly over the last few years – which, unfortunately, means more bathers, water sport enthusiasts and boaters getting into difficulty.

“There are more and more people on the water along the coast,” says Nic. “Station 4 has always been responsible for responding to calls spanning from Elands Bay to halfway to Yzerfontein – a coastal area of over 90 nautical miles. Having a station in St Helena Bay, right in the middle of this zone, reduces response times significantly and means we can save more lives at sea.”

A vessel at the forefront of maritime rescue technology, the NSRI’s JetRIB is a pioneering craft born of a collaboration between the NSRI and Droomers Yamaha in 2019. It features water-jet propulsion instead of propellers, unlike traditional two-stroke outboard petrol engines, which means it’s much safer in a rescue context (a propeller strike to casualties and rescue swimmers is a real danger in sea and flood rescue situations).

“We already had a 7,3m RIB, 'Rotary Onwards', but it’s good to have the JetRIB for surf callouts and to get in closer to navigational hazards such as the seal island at Paternoster and up the Berg River. I think the fact that we have been selected for the latest JetRIB speaks volumes to the potential for growth that Station 44 has.”

Thanks to generous donations and tireless fundraising, the R650 000 price tag per JetRIB has not stopped the NSRI from rolling out these extraordinary vessels apace, with several more in the pipeline for Strandfontein (Station 16), Yzerfontein (Station 34), Ballito (Station 41), Kei Mouth (Station 47) and Mdumbi (Station 49).

If you would like to donate towards the funding of a new JetRIB, click here.