At 1100 hrs on Monday Howth Coast Guard were tasked by MRCC Dublin to launch their boat “Grainne” to recover a semi submerged liferaft seen floating near the South Burfort Buoy. It had been spotted by the rescue helicopter “Mike Echo Sierra”. They had lowered their winchman to inspect it and were happy that there was no one on board. However they were unable to recover it as it was waterlogged and therefore too heavy for them to lift.
The boat was launched and proceeded to the coordinates of the last sighting. For the next 3 hours they searched for the raft under the guidance of MRCC who used a computer model to predict the rafts drift. Unfortunately the raft was not found and is presumed to have sunk as it had little air and was semi submerged when first spotted. The boat was stood down at 1500 hrs and returned to Howth. Weather conditions and visibility were good.
Incident No: 48/07
