St Ives RNLI welcomes its new Shannon lifeboat launch and recovery equipment

RNLI launch and recovery systems (known as SLARS) are designed for the charity’s Shannon-class lifeboats and acts like a mobile slipway which can be driven directly onto the beach for recovery.

Weighing in at 37 tonnes, this impressive piece of kit can carry an 18-tonne Shannon class lifeboat over all kinds of beach terrain, from steep shelving shingle to wet, sticky sand.

The departing SLARS (SC08), was originally delivered to St Ives in 2016, and between 2017 and 2025 it launched the station’s Shannon to 185 incidents, and on 201 exercises: a total of 386 launches. Two lives were saved by the volunteer crew on board the Shannon lifeboat within this period.

Robert Crawford, RNLI Area Technical Manager said: ‘Imagine trying to transport this 23-meter-long piece of kit through the narrow streets of St Ives and replace it with a whole new one. The south west RNLI technical team recognised this wouldn’t be feasible, and we devised a plan to swap out the old with the new via sea.

The old one is due a refit and has been on station for almost 10 years. Where we would normally do a refit and return, the set up in St Ives means it makes more sense to do this kind of swap once every 10 years or so.

There is a lot more to consider when transporting something by sea, not least the sea and weather conditions. The operation had to be put back a couple of times due to various storms coming through so its great to have completed the transfer.’

With permission to use a boatyard by the Hayle harbourmaster, the new SLARS (SC28), was transported on board a landing craft through the Hayle estuary and along the coast, coming into St Ives harbour. This was only possible thanks to the careful planning around the incoming spring tide, which had to be present to allow time to load and offload on both sites.

Matt Parr, RNLI Plant and Machinery Trainer was also involved in the operation, he added: ‘Preparations began at 4:30 am when we headed to St Ives Lifeboat Station and waited for the landing craft. It arrived there at 5 am and the SC08 was loaded onboard and transported over to the boat yard in Hayle where we unloaded. The new SLARS equipment was then loaded onto the landing craft and arrived at the lifeboat station to unload at 7:30 am.

The sea conditions were perfect, and everything went according to plan despite it being a very rainy, very wet and very cold morning!

The old launch equipment, SC08, will be going to Clayton Engineering Limited (who have designed and manufactured launch and recovery equipment for the RNLI for the past 35 years) for refit. Once refit is complete it will either be put on the relief fleet or sent to a station which needs it.