Pleasure boats will not return to Bournemouth Pier following tragic deaths
Pleasure boats will not return to Bournemouth Pier this summer following the deaths of two children in 2023.
On 31 May 2023, Joe Abbess, 17, from Southampton, and 12-year-old Sunnah Khan, from Buckinghamshire, died after being pulled from the water on Bournemouth beach with ‘critical injuries’.
Eight other children had to be rescued after getting into difficulties off the beach in Dorset, which was filled at the time with half-term holidaymakers and locals.
BCP Council has said it would spend £9.5m of government money on restoring the pier as part of the wider Levelling Up plan and so is not currently “actively considering” boats operating from it.
As reported by the BBC, Rich Herrett, BCP Council’s cabinet member for destination, leisure and commercial operations says: “Our current focus at Bournemouth Pier is the £9.5 million of Levelling-Up Funding we’re investing, mostly in the pier’s substructure; a complex element that’s largely made up of submerged reinforced concrete piles.
“These need substantial restoration work to protect them from corrosion in the harsh aquatic environment, so that the pier can continue to be enjoyed by residents and future generations for decades to come.
“This focus means we have not actively considered the prospect of boat operations resuming from Bournemouth Pier in 2025.”
In 2024, an inquest into the two deaths ruled them as accidental, and indicated that they had been caused by a rip tide.
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