Get involved in Lifeboat Saturday 2025
The RNLI’s annual street collection is fast approaching. There are plenty of ways for volunteers to get involved and continue a remarkable story of kindness to help save lives at sea.
This October, our communities will proudly come together to run street collections to raise money for the RNLI. Inspired by the first street collection in aid of the RNLI in 1891, Lifeboat Saturday is a new annual event with kindness and community at its heart.
The first ever Lifeboat Saturday in 1891 changed the face of fundraising forever. It happened in response to the worst disaster in RNLI history when, on 10 December 1886, 27 lifeboatmen from Southport and St Anne's lifeboat stations lost their lives while attempting to rescue the crew from the German barque Mexico.
More than 30,000 people lined the streets of Manchester to watch bands and floats parade through the city, while volunteers collected kind donations in tins and buckets. They raised over £5,000 (that’s over £500,000 today) – a remarkable sum. In the following years, Lifeboat Saturday became an annual event in Manchester and further afield, raising money to help power RNLI volunteer crews to the rescue.
Now we’re drawing in that remarkable story of kindness to write the next chapter of Lifeboat Saturday – raising vital funds to save lives at sea.
How to get involved
There are many ways volunteers and staff can get behind this event:
Spread the word to friends and family, and share more details on your social media.
Could you spare a few hours to help at Lifeboat Saturday? We are looking for volunteers to help at our larger regional bucket collections across the UK and Ireland. This is a great opportunity to work as a team, meet new people, have fun and boost your CV.
Events are planned in every region from 2 to 11 October, and you can find out more using these links: Cardiff, Belfast, Edinburgh, Inverness, London, Manchester, Nottingham, Plymouth.
Many fundraising branches, shops and stations have local collections already planned, or if not, you can host your own. Please find out more by asking your Community Manager or by contacting [email protected].
Further details on Lifeboat Saturday can be found on the Volunteer Zone.