For a Limited Time, It’s Now Possible To Support Us When You Shop at Asda

Jul 12, 2019

Good news, good news! For a limited time this summer, it’s possible to support us at no extra cost to yourself. How? Simply by shopping in-store at Asda St. Leonards!

Because the great news is that for the next three months, we’re one of the charity donation nominees at the St. Leonard’s store.

As a nominated rescue boat charity, the Pett Level Independent Rescue boat is in with the chance of gaining a fundraising boost through Asda’s Green Token Giving scheme.

Each store has three prizes of 1st place: £500, 2nd & 3rd place: £200 each. In each case, the donation is made by Asda, to the charity.

 

The token system

 

How it works is that qualifying purchases made at the Asda store mean you’ll be offered a green token when you pay at the checkout. Then, on the way out of the store, there’s the choice of placing your green token into the token collection point. At this point, you’ll have a choice from three charities – only one of which can win first prize.

At the end of the 3 months, the tokens are counted up and the winning charity gains the 1st place prize of £500, with the runner up charities each receiving £200 from Asda.

The other chosen charities alongside us for this fun competition are the Hastings Sea Cadets and Surviving the Streets. Both of these charities do amazing work in the local area, so please take a look at their websites and the work they do.

Doing this in advance of your shopping at Asda means you can make a well-informed choice about where to pop your green token! Of course, we’d love it if you could support us  – by the way, ours is the blue collection pathway, just like our shirts – but we’d also like you to be aware of your options – we’re all great local causes after all. As such, we’d also like to wish both the Hastings Sea Cadets and Surviving the Streets all the very best from this fundraiser too – it’s great to be sharing this opportunity with them, thanks to Asda.

 

See you there?

 

To help raise our profile, funds and sea safety awareness, Asda has also given us permission to run our own donation-day fundraiser up at Asda St. Leonards on Saturday 17th August. We’ll be up there for most of the day, complete with our Tornado boat, so it would be great if you could come along and say hello. Please do also come along and talk to us on the day if you’d like to know more about volunteering with us – it would be great to tell you all about it.

As an independent lifeboat charity, we do all of our own fundraising to pay our running and training costs.

We’d really like to say thank you so much to Asda for their support in helping us to raise these vital funds. Thank you!

A Visitor & A Big Thank You

Jun 5, 2019

This weekend we had a lovely visitor! Tony Heath came along to receive a big thank you from the PLIRB.

An enthusiastic sailor, Tony Heath recently retired his boat . Tony’s wife, Diana, suggested he might want to donate some of his equipment somewhere it would be appreciated and, thankfully for Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat, Tony chose us. And it’s true to say that we are really feeling the benefits from his decision and from the wealth of equipment he’s donated to us, including ropes and a small Zodiac boat, complete with oars.

This Zodiac boat has especially been a great extension to our training. It’s perfect for the crew to use in rescue training scenarios. Trainees can use it to row out to sea then, once offshore, the oars are taken out of the water to simulate a ‘drifting’ vessel. Crews then practice safe rescue of this smaller-sized vessel. In fact, we carried out this type of rescue last year, in particular a group of persons drifting out to open sea from the Camber area.

At the height of the season, inflatables drifting out to sea is a common call-out for us in our efforts to keep the public safe at the beach. A ‘drifting’ Zodiac is a good approximation for an inflatable of various sizes and shapes, so it’s great to have it for additional practice.

Our eagle-eyed supporters may also have spotted that the Zodiac was used in this way for the sea display last weekend at our Open Day.

This weekend it was Tony’s turn to be part of the team, when he joined crew on our Pulfer boat for a pre-training excursion. This involved a trip along the water to Cliff End, plus some interactions with the smaller Tornado boat. Tony’s wife was also able to enjoy spending time with the base crew, watching from the Look Out area of the boathouse.

Tony Heath, equipment donation, boat visitTony Heath, equipment donation, independent rescue boat charityTony Heath, equipment donation, independent rescue boat charity

We’d like to say a very public thank you to Tony for his equipment donations. These have made a big difference to us in terms of training. By supplying equipment we might otherwise have had to pay for, Tony has also saved us a significant amount of funds. Thank you so much, Tony!

Thanks to Robin Hood Bonfire Society, Icklesham

Mar 14, 2019


Recently, we were delighted to receive an invite to the Robin Hood Bonfire Society’s presentation and quiz night up at the Robin Hood in Icklesham. So on Wednesday 27th February, off we went …

Kevin Wall, RHBS Chairman & Shaun O’Hara, PLIRB Helm

Several charities and local causes, including ourselves, were invited to the presentation and we all benefitted from the extraordinary amount of work carried out by the Robin Hood Bonfire Society. All of the funds were raised at 2018’s fabulous bonfire display and from their Christmas raffle

After a brief talk from RHBS Chairman, Kevin Wall, presentations and donations were made as follows:

  • £500 to the Armed Forces Bikers, who marshalled the event.
  • £500 to the Sussex 4×4 Response team, who supported the procession and the event.
  • £500 to the Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat, who staffed the First Aid tent at the event.
  • £450 to Snowflake Shelter – a special donation for a hard-working local cause, with funds raised from the RHBS Christmas Raffle.

Then it was time for a surprise presentation highlight – £1,000 donated to Icklesham Primary School. These funds were donated specifically to help with the running costs of the school pool, and to subsidise the cost of swimming for families. The cheque was presented to Jo Barry who works at the school and manages the swimming – and also happens to be PLIRB secretary and member of the PLIRB crew.

Members of the PLIRB team enjoying the donation!

ctivity then moved on to refreshments and a Music Quiz evening, with a cash prize up for grabs. Of course, the PLIRB crew performed with great enthusiasm and effort – plus a not too shameful extent of knowledge across the team – and finished in 3rd place. Our favourite was the lego album covers round, by the way!

First place and the cash prize went to one of the RHBS teams (one of whom is also a member of the PLIRB). The warm and sharing nature of the evening was really reflected in the fact that this team immediately split the prize between the causes who had come to the event – a wonderful gesture and a brilliant extra donation for us.

Everyone here at Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat would like to say a very big thank you to everyone involved in the Robin Hood Bonfire Society – this local community support is sincerely appreciated and makes a considerable difference to us.

What’s more, we also appreciate having the chance to support the Robin Hood Bonfire display – it’s such a fantastic community event. Thank you for having us – to the presentation and to the bonfire and we’re already looking forward to 2019’s event going with a bang!

On that note, a date for the diaries is Sunday 3rd November 2019, when the next Robin Hood Bonfire Display is scheduled to take place.

Thanks to Two Sawyers, Pett

Feb 24, 2019

On Thursday 21st February, we were delighted to pop up to the Two Sawyers pub in Pett, to present a certificate of thanks for recent donations.

The Two Sawyers have been taking donations into a custom-made donation box, all of which has added up to a recent donation of just over £100 to us. A short certificate presentation, and a celebratory round of drinks (mostly soft ones, of course) took place as we said thank you to the team at the Two Sawyers. Publican and owner Mark Fleischer and barstaff Karen are pictured receiving the certificate of thanks, along with Dave Martin, PLIRB chairman.

Everyone here at Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat would like to say a very big thank you staff and customers of the Two Sawyers – this local community support is sincerely appreciated and makes a considerable difference to what we’re able to achieve in replacing vital equipment and providing an essential independent local rescue service along the local coastline (and beyond).

We really couldn’t do it without this kind of support, thank you all very much.

 

 

Thanks to Dynamic Events, Rye

Feb 4, 2019

On Sunday 3rd February, we were delighted to have a visit to the base from the wonderfully supportive team at Dynamic Events in Rye, who came to present us with a marvellous cheque for £2022.90. This very welcome donation is the result of some very hard work fundraising on behalf of Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat, as an independent rescue charity.

It all began last summer when the staff team at Dynamic Events decided to take part in September 2018’s Dragonboat Race at Bewl Water. However, when asked which charity they’d be fundraising for, they had a little trouble deciding. But staff member Jo Stapley, who also happens to be a trainee crew volunteer here at the PLIRB, was quick to share with her colleagues our efforts in raising money to buy and refit a reserve launch & recovery vehicle. Once Jo shared this water-themed cause, and the question was put to a vote, Jo’s colleagues were quick to get on board with the idea, with PLIRB winning the vote as the chosen charity.

As we shared at the time, the Dynamic Events Dragonboat was manned (and of course womanned) by a superb crew of Dynamic Events staff, PLIRB volunteers, plus a few interested (and very helpful) families and friends to make up the numbers. Despite coming in last in every race, this fabulous crew had a fantastic time and managed to raise a significant sum for us whilst doing so.

In fact, now that all of the monies have been collected and counted, Dynamic Events were able to donate a cheque for £2022.90, which is an amazing result for all their hard work in raising funds with quiz nights, fun events and a dedicated GoFundMe page.

As the top photo shows, several Dynamic Events staff members came down for the presentation whilst many of our boat and base crews, including Jo Stapley, were also down at the base for our usual Sunday morning training. It was great to be able to get together and enjoy some early spring sunshine and receive (with grateful thanks) the cheque.

Dynamic Events, fundraising, donations, cheque presentation, independent rescue charity,

The cropped in photo above shows (front row, L to R) PLIRB Chairman, David Martin, receiving the cheque from Claire Bowley (Dynamic Events Operations Director), Malcolm Wallace (Dynamic Events Managing Director), Kelsey Morgan (Events Assistant), Amelia Simpson (Event Manager), and Tara O’Shea (Event Assistant) and Jo Stapley (representing both Dynamic Events and PlIRB).  Also in the close-up are PLIRB crew members (back row, L to R) Isaac Dyer, Ethan Beech, John Crowther and Darren Barry,

Everyone here at Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat would like to say a very big thank you to all concerned at Dynamic Events, as well as all those who supported their fundraising with donations and sponsorship. This kind of support is sincerely appreciated and is really making a difference to us in what we’re able to achieve in replacing vital equipment and providing an essential independent local rescue service along the local coastline (and beyond).

We really couldn’t do it without this kind of support, thank you all very much.

 

Thanks to Eastbourne Historic Vehicle Club

Jan 29, 2019

Last Thursday 24th January, members of the Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat committee were invited along to a presentation evening by the Eastbourne Historic Vehicle Club.

The club runs lots of activities, shows and festivals and invited us along to receive a share of funds raised at the Hellingly Festival of Transport, which took place last August. The event itself took place over the same infamous weekend as our own Open Day and as our own supporters know, the weather on the Sunday was rather against outdoor events!

However, thankfully for the EHVC, their festival ran over the whole weekend so the fair weather days meant it was well attended, as club Chairman, Steve Young shared:

“The 2018 Festival of Transport last August was blessed with fine weather for two days out of three, with the Sunday, unfortunately, a ‘little wet’. However, the show was enjoyed by entrants and visitors alike and we had a great weekend. We are delighted to maintain our annual donations to local charities, which over the last 43 years have totalled a figure approaching £200,000.”

The EHCV are now busy planning 2019’s big event, the 44th Festival of Transport which will be held at Broad Farm. But meanwhile, at Thursday’s presentation, cheques were presented by EHVC Vice-President, Mike Bray, to representatives of St.Wilfrid’s Hospice (£500), The Friends of Eastbourne Hospital (£500), KSS Air Ambulance Trust (£500) and the Pett Level Rescue Boat Association (£250).  Other donations have been made to Eastbourne RNLI (£250) and local Hellingly organisations.

190124 Donation Presentation, Eastbourne Historic Vehicle Club

The £250 donation is much appreciated and will almost certainly be going in the direction of supporting our own historic vehicle – our reserve launch vehicle – as it is refurbished to become fit for the very specific purposes of getting our boats safely launched and recovered along the ever-changing Pett Level Beach.

Everyone here at Pett Level Independent Rescue Boat would like to say a very big thank you to all concerned at the EHVC and those who supported the 2018 festival. We really couldn’t do it without this kind of support, so thank you very much.

Header image (L to R): John Brooker & John Pulfer (PLIRB), Mike Bray (EHVC Vice-President), David Martin.

In-post image (L to R): Pett Level Rescue Boat Association, Mike Bray (EHVC Vice-President), Kent, Surrey & Sussex Air Ambulance Trust, St. Wilfrid’s Hospice, Friends of Eastbourne Hospital and PLIRB again far right.

Thanks to Dave Bone, Secretary EHVC for photographs and permissions.