Girvan Lifeboat Station
| All-Weather Lifeboat | |
|---|---|
| Launch Method | Moored afloat |
| Address | Girvan Harbour, Girvan, South Ayrshire, KA26 9AG |
| Telephone | 01465 714454 |
Explore two centuries of RNLI lifeboat history, heroic rescues, and the enduring tradition of saving lives at sea.
On the east shore of the Firth of Clyde in Carrick, with the great rock of Ailsa Craig rising offshore, Girvan runs a Shannon-class all-weather lifeboat from its harbour, covering commercial and leisure traffic on the firth. A lifeboat has served the town since 1865.
With few lifeboats in south-west Scotland in the 1850s, the RNLI decided that the fishing town of Girvan would be a good station, opening it in 1865. The first boat was paid for by the Glasgow insurance broker Alexander Kay, and the boathouse built on land given by the Duchesse de Coigny; it was rebuilt in 1910, and a motor lifeboat arrived in 1931.
The station’s records carry some characteristic touches of its rural setting: the Thanks of the Institution was once awarded to two men who rode a tandem bicycle thirteen miles through the night from Girvan to Ballantrae, arriving covered in mud, to raise the alarm about a vessel in distress when the telegraph had failed.
The station moved to its present site in 1993. In 2018 it received the Shannon-class Elizabeth and Gertrude Allan — the first Shannon built entirely at the RNLI’s new All-weather Lifeboat Centre at Poole, and the first on the west coast of Scotland.
