Base showcase: Station 42 (Kleinmond)

Established in 2018, this base has earned acclaim for its exceptional training and pioneering Pink Rescue Buoy initiative.

As one of the relatively ‘newer’ NSRI bases (Station 42 in Kleinmond was established in 2018), it has already racked up an impressive reputation: It has won Station Excellence accolades each year within the NSRI, it is only one of four bases nationally where Class 4 Coxswains come to qualify and has one of the most well-run Pink Rescue Buoy (PRB) programmes in the country.

“Being in a small town like Kleinmond, over time, we’ve found we’re most effective if we focus on the quality of training and the commitment and experience of the crew rather than size. We work best with a crew of about 20 or so, which is where we’re at right now,” says station commander Schalk Boonzaaier, who has deep roots in the area, having lived in Kleinmond his whole life.

Schalk points out that they also owe the success of their PRB programme to Geoff Garrett, a local who has taken on the task of expanding and monitoring this lifesaving public rescue equipment in the area – from Rooi Els to Pringle Bay, Betties Bay, Kleinmond and Palmiet River – checking the equipment hasn’t been tampered with or stolen.

Geoff’s son, Geoffrey, is also involved. Together, they are working with the NSRI to develop an app that will allow members of the public to report lost, found, or stolen buoys and rescues.

Like many other NSRI bases, Station 42 was founded by a group of like-minded locals after a particularly tragic drowning in 2017.

“A group of us who’d mostly grown up in Kleinmond and had a background in lifesaving decided to start an informal lifesaving response team, and one of our members, Ferdi Krige, approached the NSRI for advice on what kind of kit we’d need to acquire,” says Schalk. “We were told that a base was needed in Kleinmond: would we consider starting an official NSRI station? And that’s how it began.”

Station 17 (Hermanus) took the Kleinmond crew under their wing and commenced training.

This was the first time deputy station commander Marco Pretorius had engaged in sea rescue work, having moved to Kleinmond only a few years previously from Limpopo. Marco works with Schalk, and although he originally agreed to join as a shore controller (unsure of his sea legs) when the base was founded, he was soon roped into the sea-going crew and thereafter became deputy.

“I’m still not as sure at sea as the guys who grew up with it, but I listen and learn and get by. It was quite an achievement for me to go from never having been at sea, to a Class 4 Coxswain, to deputy station commander in just five years.”

According to Marco, the NSRI is firmly embedded in the town, which takes pride in their station. “We get a lot of support from the community. People donate; they wish us well. It’s amazing.”

Station 42’s base was, and still is, an old shed close to the harbour, which was refurbished last year.

“We don’t really have room to grow our crew – we’re currently at our limit,” says Schalk, although that hasn’t deterred them from planning to expand their junior crew division. “The challenge is to hold on to the crew we have. Experience counts for a lot, and that takes time. Many of the founding members are still here, and while we are never short of volunteers, there is a higher turnover than I’d like because people leave for various reasons: work, study, relocating… So that’s my challenge: to retain 15 to 20 seasoned rescue crew.”

As challenges go, this one seems achievable, considering everything Schalk and fellow founding members have achieved so far.

His proudest accomplishment? “The people that we've saved. That’s the long and the short of it; it’s why we are here. The child we save here, the parent we save there… That type of emotion is, for me, the proudest thing. Seeing inexperienced crew members come in, and watching them train and develop until they are capable of saving somebody's life. That’s the most rewarding thing for me, to pass on that knowledge to somebody else. It's a life skill, never mind if you’re a crew member or not.”

If you would like to contribute to Station 42 by becoming a volunteer, a Pink Rescue Buoy Custodian, or making a donation, visit their base page here.