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Displaying items by tag: Morten Espersen

#Rowing: Ireland coach Dominic Casey has been chosen as one of the finalists for the Coach of the Year at the World Rowing Awards for the second successive year. Casey coaches the Ireland lightweights, who had an extraordinary 2017.

 The lightweight pair of Mark O’Donovan and Shane O’Driscoll capped a year of wins in the World Cup events and the European Championships with a World Championship gold. Paul O’Donovan also took top position on the podium in Florida after winning the lightweight single sculls. He and his brother Gary had taken two World Cup medals and a European Championship silver in the lightweight double. Denise Walsh was a World Championship finalist and took medals at the European Championships and the World Cup in Belgrade. The Ireland lightweight quadruple and the lightweight pair of David O’Malley and Shane Mulvaney took medals at the World Under-23 Championships.

 Casey has also been nominated for an award for Distinguished Services to International Rowing. Former Ireland high performance director, Morten Espersen, is also a nominee for this award.

Published in Rowing

#Rowing: The high performance director of Rowing Ireland, Morten Espersen, has resigned. Espersen emailed his decision to the chief executive of Rowing Ireland, Hamish Adams.

 “On behalf of the entire Board and Staff I wish Morten well in the next phase of his professional and personal life and would like to personally thank him for his huge contribution to rowing in Ireland over the last four years,” Adams said. 

 “Morten will be working closely with us for the next three months to ensure our high performance programme continues to go from strength to strength.”

Published in Rowing

The Philips Sports Manager of the Month for August is being shared by the two succesful Olympic medal winning coaches – both in waterports – from Rio. 

Irish Sailing Association Olympic coach Rory Fitzpatrick and Morten Espersen, the High Performance Director and Olympic Manager with Rowing Ireland are joint winners of the prestigious award for the month of August.

The award is an acknowledgement of the success of sailor Annalise Murphy and rowers Gary and Paul O’Donovan at the Olympic Games in Rio.

Annalise and the O'Donovan brothers brought home silver medals in the Laser Radial Sailing and Lightweight Double Sculls rowing categories respectively.

The sailing medal was the first since Moscow in 1980 and the O’Donovan brothers secured the first ever medal for Ireland in rowing.

Published in Olympic

Royal National Lifeboat Institute (RNLI) in Ireland Information

The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) is a charity to save lives at sea in the waters of UK and Ireland. Funded principally by legacies and donations, the RNLI operates a fleet of lifeboats, crewed by volunteers, based at a range of coastal and inland waters stations. Working closely with UK and Ireland Coastguards, RNLI crews are available to launch at short notice to assist people and vessels in difficulties.

RNLI was founded in 1824 and is based in Poole, Dorset. The organisation raised €210m in funds in 2019, spending €200m on lifesaving activities and water safety education. RNLI also provides a beach lifeguard service in the UK and has recently developed an International drowning prevention strategy, partnering with other organisations and governments to make drowning prevention a global priority.

Irish Lifeboat Stations

There are 46 lifeboat stations on the island of Ireland, with an operational base in Swords, Co Dublin. Irish RNLI crews are tasked through a paging system instigated by the Irish Coast Guard which can task a range of rescue resources depending on the nature of the emergency.

Famous Irish Lifeboat Rescues

Irish Lifeboats have participated in many rescues, perhaps the most famous of which was the rescue of the crew of the Daunt Rock lightship off Cork Harbour by the Ballycotton lifeboat in 1936. Spending almost 50 hours at sea, the lifeboat stood by the drifting lightship until the proximity to the Daunt Rock forced the coxswain to get alongside and successfully rescue the lightship's crew.

32 Irish lifeboat crew have been lost in rescue missions, including the 15 crew of the Kingstown (now Dun Laoghaire) lifeboat which capsized while attempting to rescue the crew of the SS Palme on Christmas Eve 1895.

FAQs

While the number of callouts to lifeboat stations varies from year to year, Howth Lifeboat station has aggregated more 'shouts' in recent years than other stations, averaging just over 60 a year.

Stations with an offshore lifeboat have a full-time mechanic, while some have a full-time coxswain. However, most lifeboat crews are volunteers.

There are 46 lifeboat stations on the island of Ireland

32 Irish lifeboat crew have been lost in rescue missions, including the 15 crew of the Kingstown (now Dun Laoghaire) lifeboat which capsized while attempting to rescue the crew of the SS Palme on Christmas Eve 1895

In 2019, 8,941 lifeboat launches saved 342 lives across the RNLI fleet.

The Irish fleet is a mixture of inshore and all-weather (offshore) craft. The offshore lifeboats, which range from 17m to 12m in length are either moored afloat, launched down a slipway or are towed into the sea on a trailer and launched. The inshore boats are either rigid or non-rigid inflatables.

The Irish Coast Guard in the Republic of Ireland or the UK Coastguard in Northern Ireland task lifeboats when an emergency call is received, through any of the recognised systems. These include 999/112 phone calls, Mayday/PanPan calls on VHF, a signal from an emergency position indicating radio beacon (EPIRB) or distress signals.

The Irish Coast Guard is the government agency responsible for the response to, and co-ordination of, maritime accidents which require search and rescue operations. To carry out their task the Coast Guard calls on their own resources – Coast Guard units manned by volunteers and contracted helicopters, as well as "declared resources" - RNLI lifeboats and crews. While lifeboats conduct the operation, the coordination is provided by the Coast Guard.

A lifeboat coxswain (pronounced cox'n) is the skipper or master of the lifeboat.

RNLI Lifeboat crews are required to follow a particular development plan that covers a pre-agreed range of skills necessary to complete particular tasks. These skills and tasks form part of the competence-based training that is delivered both locally and at the RNLI's Lifeboat College in Poole, Dorset

 

While the RNLI is dependent on donations and legacies for funding, they also need volunteer crew and fund-raisers.

© Afloat 2020