RNLI only £45k short of £1m target for new Loch Ness lifeboat station
AMBITIOUS plans to build a new £1 million lifeboat station at Loch Ness are closer to becoming a reality with the fundraising appeal just £45,000 short of its target after only four months.
Donations have come from the local community as well as further afield to help replace the RNLI base at Temple Pier in Drumnadrochit.
The current premises are too cramped to accommodate the lifeboat and all the equipment and provide decent training space for the volunteer crew.
Other fundraisers are now being planned to help it reach the target including a crowdfunding campaign, which would be a first for the RNLI, and a swim along Loch Ness by volunteer lifeboat crew members.
Lifeboat operations manager Ewan Cameron described the public response to the appeal as "excellent".
He said: "It is phenomenal. It shows what people think about the lifeboat and the job the volunteers do in saving lives, as well as what the RNLI does.
"It is not just local people. We are getting donations from a wider area but we still have another £45,000 to go which is still a lot of money and hard work."
Mr Cameron highlighted some of the ways in which money is being raised including how a Lancashire man had walked the Great Glen and climbed a couple of mountains with a team.
"He was rescued by the RNLI on one occasion and every year he does some fundraising," Mr Cameron said.
"When he and his team found out we were fundraising for a new lifeboat station, they said they would support that."
Pupils at a local primary school filled an RNLI-issue wellington with coins while Glenurquhart High School held a dress-down day. There has been support from businesses and organisations too.
"Some have donated £1000 while individuals might give £10," Mr Cameron said. "Every bit helps."
Crew members and their families and friends are also getting involved.
The station’s launch authority, Joanna Stebbings – whose husband is the lifeboat’s helmsman – has organised stalls at local events such as a fete at Fort Augustus and a craft fair at Drumnadrochit. Crew members are also planning to swim the entire length of Loch Ness, possibly in October.
The new station, which will be at the same location, will be about four times the size of the existing premises.
Mr Cameron anticipated the groundwork would be carried out over the winter of 2016/17 and the new station would open in 2017.
Anne Scott, the RNLI community fundraising manager for an area stretching from Aberdeen to Orkney, said the response had been "fantastic".
"It really is amazing to have raised this amount in such a short space of time," she said. "People have really got behind it which is really encouraging."
They ranged from the local Women’s Royal Institute to Portsoy Rowing Club and a text-to-donate campaign also raked in cash.
Mrs Scott, who is looking to recruit volunteer fundraisers in the Loch Ness area, outlined the difference the new premises would make.
"The lifeboat will be under cover and protected from the elements," she said.
"It takes quite a bruising from basically being on the loch. It means, especially in the winter time, they have to take the temperature before it can be launched. Sometimes it involves scraping off ice and snow.
"The new lifeboat station will also make it easier to do the training which is important to enable the lifeboat crew to keep up their skills."
- Anyone wanting to donate to the appeal can do so by texting RNLI LOCHNESS to 70300.
