At 9:15 this morning the volunteers of Skerries Coast Guard were tasked to investigate reports of a grounded boat at Skerries. A concerned member of the public had contacted the Coast Guard’s rescue control centre to report that the twenty foot open boat was aground on rocks at Colt Island. Colt Island is a small uninhabited island lying approximately half a mile from the Skerries shoreline. There was concern that someone may have fallen overboard from the boat earlier in the morning.

The Skerries Coast Guard team were dispatched to the scene within minutes of the tasking and observed the boat from the nearby Red Island headland at Skerries. These observations confirmed that the boat was not drifting but did appear to be partially submerged. As a precaution, Skerries Coast Guard requested the launch of the Skerries lifeboat to retrieve the boat for further examination.

The lifeboat successfully towed the boat back to Skerries harbour where it was more closely examined by the Coast Guard team. From this examinaiton, the Coast Guard concluded that the boat had simply drifted from moorings and that no further action was required.

Incident # 20 of 2009