Celebrating National Coastwatch Volunteers in Whitstable

NCI watchkeepers provide eyes and ears along the coast, keeping watch and monitoring radio channels to provide a listening watch in poor visibility. When people find themselves in trouble, NCI can alert the Coastguard and direct emergency and rescue services.

The Whitstable branch's beachfront Watch Station is manned primarily by 60 marine and naval retirees 6 days a week, 52 weeks a year.

Louise is pictured here with the two senior trainers. Pat Solley (right) is ex- Royal Navy and Brian Maflin (centre) is a Master Mariner and former hovercraft pilot.

Their knowledge of the local waters and experience in maritime are critically important to the team. They enjoy sharing their expertise with new recruits and are part of a diverse group who choose to become Coastwatch volunteers for a variety of reasons.

The Seafarers’ Charity supported NCI’s application to upgrade their seafront station to a better location, with improved equipment. Part of our grant will also go towards the costs of the volunteer training programme.

Over lunch, Louise heard stories about how the volunteers came to join up: from wanting to make friends after they moved to the area; to keeping active as part of retirement; and being part of an obviously warm and dedicated crew which reportedly has very few dropouts after training. Attendees then celebrated NCI’s newest recruit (who was just seventeen), as well as those being recognised after 15 years of service.

We look forward to seeing how our award improves the team’s ability to respond to emergencies, as well as enhancing the experience of Coastwatch’s invaluable volunteers.