Pro-active assessment for National Coastwatch
Early February saw the third annual inspection of the National Coastwatch Station at Gosport, Hampshire UK.
It is carried out on behalf of HM Coastguard in order to ensure that the NCI continues to maintain the high level of competence required in its role as a Declared Facility Status Unit of the UK Maritime Search & Rescue Service.
NCI regional assessor, Ian Weston and Paul Marlow, the local liaison officer from Solent Coastguard, spent a full day with the team in the former naval signal tower which overlooks the busy entrance to Portsmouth Harbour at Fort Blockhouse, putting the duty volunteer watchkeepers through procedures and exercises designed to test their reaction to all manner of coastal emergencies. The eight members of the station management committee were there as well to provide support during the inspection and background information about the work and constitution of the unit.
An inshore lifeboat from the Gosport and Fareham Inshore Rescue Service (GAFIRS), based at nearby Gilkicker Point, was also on hand, at the invitation of National Coastwatch, to take part in the exercise. It provided a valuable opportunity for watchkeepers to practise directing rescue craft towards simulated casualty vessels out in the Solent by radio, thereby adding a further degree of realism to the proceedings.
At the end of the assessment programme, the examining team were more than satisfied that NCI Gosport provides a high standard of visual surveillance across the Eastern Solent and Portsmouth Harbour and they were therefore happy to endorse the station’s operational certificate for a further year.
This officially authorises NCI Gosport to continue its daily watch over people and vessels of all types using inshore waters in the immediate vicinity of one of Britain’s busiest harbours, linking directly with the Coastguard Maritime Rescue Co-ordination Centre at Lee-on-the-Solent, which is responsible for launching the appropriate rescue response in the event of a local coastal emergency.
The success of the search and rescue element of this exercise has also prompted a new closer relationship between GAFIRS and National Coastwatch at Gosport and they plan to conduct mutually beneficial joint training exercises on a regular basis in the future in order to improve communication and cooperation still further between the two organisations.
By David Russell
