Rock Lifeboat Station
| Inshore Lifeboat | |
|---|---|
| Launch Method | Carriage |
| Address | Ferry Point, Rock, Cornwall, PL27 6LD |
| Telephone | 01208 863033 |
Explore two centuries of RNLI lifeboat history, heroic rescues, and the enduring tradition of saving lives at sea.
On the east side of the Camel estuary, opposite Padstow, Rock runs a single D-class inshore lifeboat, providing fast cover in the estuary and close inshore around the treacherous Doom Bar. Established in 1994, it filled the gap left when the Padstow all-weather lifeboat moved out to Trevose Head, returning a lifeboat to the estuary itself.
A lifeboat had launched for Padstow from Hawker’s Cove, on the west side of the estuary, since 1827. As the river silted, launches there became increasingly difficult, and in 1967 the Padstow station was moved out of the estuary to Trevose Head. That left the estuary itself without a lifeboat, with incidents inside the Doom Bar dealt with by local boats.
In 1993 the Padstow Harbour Commissioners asked the RNLI to provide an inshore lifeboat for the River Camel, the area having previously been covered by a private rescue service that was no longer operating. A D-class was deployed for evaluation in 1994 from a temporary boathouse at Rock, on the east side of the estuary.
The trial proved a success, and the station was made permanent; a purpose-built boathouse was completed in June 1997. In its first eleven years the Rock lifeboat launched 220 times and saved 80 lives. The estuary is a busy summer playground of dinghies, paddleboards and small craft, threaded by shifting sandbanks and a fast tide, and the D-class — the PJS since 2014 — answers everything from broken-down boats and stranded walkers to swimmers caught out on the bar, often working alongside the Padstow all-weather lifeboat.
