Sheringham RNLI’s rescue services suspended after structural concerns about building
All activity at Sheringham RNLI (Norfolk) has been suspended with immediate effect. The news comes after a structural survey of the lifeboat station building resulted in serious safety concerns.
“The station backs onto steep land that may be at risk of sliding forward,” says Anna Heslop, RNLI regional operations lead, North and East. “We had an inspection on our lifeboat station building and we’ve responded swiftly to initial findings about its condition.”
While search and rescue cover is being provided by Wells RNLI and Cromer RNLI, work will continue to understand the increased safety concerns. Initial findings indicate that the lifeboat station building may be at the end of its lifespan and that fact, combined with what is already known about the land behind, has led to services being suspended.
An independent structural engineer inspected the building and its position against the cliff just before Christmas 2024. The full report was made available in January 2025.
Heslop says the decision to suspend all activity was incredibly difficult.
“Keeping our people safe is our number one priority, it takes courage to speak up about what could go wrong, and that’s what happened here – but we don’t underestimate just how hard this is for our Sheringham volunteers who are, rightly, proud of their part in the RNLI’s purpose of saving lives at sea.
“A monitoring system has been in place – but, on further analysis on Thursday 30 January with a wider group of estates experts, the nature of the risk to the safety of our people was deemed too high to mitigate and manage by the monitoring system alone.
“We want people to volunteer, and work, in the safest possible environment. The expertise offered on 30 January tells us that we must keep our people out of the station for now and have further work done to fully understand the condition of the building.”
One online commentator says that this is a very sad day for Sheringham’s lifeboat, and notes “it’s a very large area that needs to be covered by the flank stations, hopefully the RNLI can come up with a solution before the summer.”
The video below was shared by North Norfolk District Council. It’s of Sidestrand, another beach in the area, taken in February 2024 of a cliff slip caused by prolonged heavy rain. The rain had soaked into the soft sediment and impacted the integrity of the cliff.
Cliffs store water until the internal sediment becomes unstable and a slip can take place hours, days or weeks after the initial rain. With longer periods of adverse weather, this process can happen rapidly or at any point along the coastline, says the council’s post.
Main image courtesy of Sheringham RNLI via Facebook
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