Saving Lives at Sea

Dermot O'Leary uncovers the story of the RNLI's heroic efforts in the Second World War, as its crews were called to serve in the most perilous of conditions, saving 6,376 lives.

In Dungeness, the crew are called out to reports of a small boat in the middle of the shipping lanes, and they discover that the casualty is the subject of a major manhunt.

In Porthcawl, a fisherman has been dragged lifeless out of the sea by bystanders. The lifeboat crew race to the beach and join the desperate attempts to resuscitate him.

In Castletownbere, crew member Donagh faces a baptism of fire on his first shout as the crew carry out a dramatic rescue of a fisherman who has suffered a suspected stroke.

In Queensferry, on the east coast of Scotland, an American visitor is caught out by the tide and is barely conscious when the RNLI crew drag him out of the water.

Every one of the RNLI's crew members brings their own unique skills to the station at which they volunteer. But they're all united by one key element: trust.

In Humber, the crew must work closely together to pull off the dangerous medivac of a fisherman with a spinal injury. On the south west coast of Ireland, the Castletownbere crew race to the rescue of a fishing trawler that's run aground at nearby Dursey Island and is in danger of breaking up on the rocks.

In the north Devon village of Clovelly, the crew launch in severe weather to assist a yacht that has lost all power. And the Ilfracombe lifeboat launches when cliff walkers spot a boat capsizing - and a man in the freezing water.

In the 200 years since the RNLI was founded, its crews have saved the lives of over 146,000 people. But even with all that experience behind them, shouts often balance on a knife edge. In Walmer, on the Kent coast, following reports of a major incident involving a small boat, the crew respond to another tasking; on arrival they are faced with mass casualties in the freezing water. In north Wales, the crew race to the rescue of a yacht that's lost all power and is drifting towards a wind farm, with a 75-year-old skipper at the helm - and his two young grandsons below deck. It's all hands on deck for the Plymouth crew as they wrestle with a small fishing boat drifting towards the rocks, with three casualties on board, two of them needing urgent medical attention. And the Aberystwyth crew must pull off the tricky extraction of a woman with a badly broken leg.

Whenever their pagers sound, the volunteers of the RNLI immediately find themselves under pressure.

In Port Isaac, on the north coast of Cornwall, the crew race to the rescue of a female casualty with a spinal injury; she's in a precarious position on a rockface, with the light fading. In Pembrokeshire, south west Wales, the Little & Broadhaven crew receive a mayday call about a capsized dinghy with three people in the water.

In Mudeford, on the Dorset coast, a search for a missing kayaker quickly escalates when it emerges that there are six more kayaks unaccounted for. And in Eyemouth, on the east coast of Scotland, the crew respond to an unusual rescue: a swan in the harbour that's become tangled in fishing line.

On the north Somerset coast, the Minehead crew come close to disaster in a challenging rescue of two walkers cut off by the tide.

In Porthcawl, on the south-west coast of Wales, the crew receive a call about a swimmer who's been swept out to sea in a rip current - as his wife and son watch on helplessly.