Station

The St Davids lifeboat station is situated a couple of miles from Britain’s smallest city at Porthstinan (St Justinans) in Ramsey Sound. The station operates two lifeboats - the Tyne class all-weather lifeboat 'Garside' and the D-class inshore lifeboat 'Dewi Sant / St David'.

St Davids ALB Boathouse and Slipway

These cover an area of about 550 square miles from Skomer Island in the south to Abermawr in the north and halfway across the Irish Sea. Additional support cover is provided for the flanking stations of Fishguard to the north and Angle (Milford Haven) to the south for major incidents where more than one lifeboat is required. This area includes a large number of offshore rocks and islands and is notorious for it’s strong tides.

Pembrokeshire, South West Wales

The lifeboat crew is made up of people from all walks of life all of whom live within about 3 miles of the boathouse. Although there are some 25 crew members available, only one - the Mechanic - is employed on a full-time basis. The remainder are volunteers who are called to duty by pagers and maroon rockets.

St Davids Lifeboat Crew and Launching Authorities 1997

The station has it’s own branch committee which amongst it’s members inlcudes a station treasurer, medical advisor, press officer, two deputy launching authorities and an Honorary Secretary. It is the secretary (or the deputy launching authorities) who are contacted by the local coastguard in Milford Haven to authorise the launching of the lifeboat in an emergency.

The station also has a very succesful fund raising unit in the Ladies Lifeboat Guild which was formed in 1957 and which raises upto £25,000 annually for the RNLI. A large number of events are organised every year including coffee mornings, car boot sales, cheese and wine evenings, sales of souvenirs, street collections, raffles, etc. A number of members have received recognition for their hard work through the presentation of gold and silver badges, certificates and statuettes.