It has been another busy day for the Isle of Wight's lifeboat crews, with Bembridge RNLI reaching 60 shouts for the year following the addition of two further callouts today (Friday, August 18).

Bembridge all-weather lifeboat was launched this morning to assist a 40ft sailing yacht with two crew on board which had suffered engine failure.

The engines issues happened in the Solent near No Man’s Fort and the vessel could not make its own way to Portsmouth under sail.

Conditions were challenging, but the crew did not take long to locate the yacht.

After transferring a crew member onto the yacht, it was decided that towing the vessel to Portsmouth was the safest option.

Once the yacht was safely at Haslar Marina, the lifeboat crew stayed alongside, as conditions on the slipway back to Bembridge were too rough to recover. 

At 3.15pm, the crew were called to locate and assist a 38ft yacht with an injured skipper and six other crew off Osborne Bay.

Cowes RNLI’s lifeboat arrived at the scene first and dealt with the incident, with the Bembridge crew waiting as backup support.

Bembridge lifeboat returned to the offshore boathouse by 6pm.