Following a “wear a T-shirt for SARA day” held on Thursday 15th July 2010, Churchdown Village Junior School have generously donated £158.50 to SARA’s Tewkesbury Station to go towards a new engine which is desperately needed.
This followed a visit by 2 crew members on the 12th July where they talked about water safety in the school’s assembly.
Tewkesbury Station is pleased to announce the arrival of their brand new rescue boat. The Jeanneau Rigiflex Newmatic (SARA 11) was able to be purchased due to the generosity of the general public. SARA is funded totally by donations and fundraising, including street collections, the most recent involving Tewkesbury Crew was at Evesham Morrisons on 26th June where a staggering £1054 was raised!
The new boat is now housed alongside Tewkesbury’s existing boat, SARA 6, at Basepoint in Tewkesbury, who are kindly leasing a unit to SARA as an interim measure until permanent premises are found.
Tewkesbury are now able to provide comprehensive safety boat cover at local events, as well as continuing to work alongside the other 3 stations when called upon to by the emergency services during search and rescue/recovery operations. SARA 11 completed her first operation on Saturday 19th June at Tewkesbury Regatta, where 8 schools converged on the Severn at Lower Lode for the annual competition.
“Everybody from SARA worked extremely hard. Happily for us, no rowers needed our assistance. The only drama occurred when a pleasure cruiser became grounded as it was navigating the boating channel on the course and got stuck. SARA crew towed this large craft to deeper waters where they were able to continue their journey.”
Sarah Kneath, SARA Tewkesbury Chairman
SARA Tewkesbury would like to thank the public for their overwhelming generosity and making the acquisition of this vital rescue boat possible.
See this sory in the news:
Gloucestershire Echo – Delight as boat unveiled for rescue missions
Back in May this year, Councilor Elaine Hancox was sworn in as the new Mayor of Tewkesbury Borough.
This week saw an announcement in the Summer 2010 edition of the ’Tewkesbury Borough News’, a council produced newspaper, that she would be supporting The Severn Area Rescue Association by making them one of her five chosen charities for the year.
Everyone is encouraged to look out for the mayor’s upcoming fundraising events, the proceeds of which will be donated to the mayor’s chosen charities.
“With the help of the mayoral team, I look forward to serving this community and pledge to do my very best to use the civic year to support, facilitate and enable initiatives of benefit to all within the borough of Tewkesbury.”
Mayor Cllr Elaine Hancox
We would like to thank the Mayor for pledging her support to SARA.
Click to download a copy of Tewkesbury Borough News, Summer 2010 (8.2Mb)
Tewkesbury Borough News is the Council-produced newspaper published three times a year and delivered to every household in Tewkesbury Borough.
Tewkesbury Abbey held their annual fate on the 31st May, crew from SARA’s Tewkesbury station were there to talk to people about the work SARA is doing and to raise awareness of the new station in the town.
Several membership forms were given out, and we look forward to seeing them in our inbox in the near future.
The crew also had a collection bucket into which the public donated over £200. This money will be used to help fund the services offered by SARA to the local community. Thank you for your continued support.
Crew from Tewkesbury and Beachley attended a Swiftwater Rescue training course last weekend in Cumbria.
This course trains personnel in suitable techniques to undertake rescues in a swiftwater and flood environment. Eight SARA crew attended the course six new SRT crew and two renewals.
The course was a great success and has increased the number of SARA Swiftwater Technicians.
