Tramore Lifeboat Station
| Inshore Lifeboat | |
|---|---|
| Launch Method | Carriage |
| Address | Lady Elizabeth's Cove, Tramore, County Waterford, Ireland |
| Telephone | 051 381 622 |
Explore two centuries of RNLI lifeboat history, heroic rescues, and the enduring tradition of saving lives at sea.
Tramore Lifeboat Station serves the popular County Waterford seaside resort, on a bay long notorious for shipwreck. A lifeboat was first established here in 1858, and across its history the station’s crews have been honoured with 18 awards for gallantry. In 1964 Tramore received the first inshore lifeboat placed in Ireland, and it operates a D-class inshore lifeboat today, covering the strand and bay of this busy holiday coast.
Tramore Bay, a wide bay backed by a long strand, was the scene of repeated wrecks — most infamously the loss of the troopship Seahorse in 1816, when over 300 lives were lost. Coastguards and local men won early medals for surf rescues here, including farmer Pat Coffey, who in 1835 rode his horse into the breakers to get a line to a wrecked schooner. After two local fishermen drowned trying to save a French crew in 1858, the townspeople appealed for a lifeboat, and a 30-foot pulling-and-sailing boat was placed at Lady Elizabeth’s Cove that year.
Between 1861 and 1875 no fewer than 11 Silver Medals were awarded to Tramore crews, several to the long-serving Coxswain Richard O. Johns. The station closed in 1924 once a motor lifeboat was placed at Dunmore East, but in June 1964 it was re-established with a D-class inshore lifeboat — the first ILB in Ireland.
The current D-class, Isabella Purchase (D-781), funded by the estate of Mrs Ivy ‘Isabella’ Purchase, has been on service since 2015.
