S2 E3 The Arranmore Lifeboat

The Tides That Tie – The Arranmore Lifeboat

For more than a century, the lifeboat crew on Arranmore have answered the call when someone is in danger at sea.

In this episode of The Tides That Tie, we hear from Nora Flanagan, Ciaran O’Donnell, and John McCafferty about the history and mission of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution station on Arranmore.

From early lifeboats powered by oars and sails to today’s modern rescue vessel, the story of the RNLI is one of volunteers, community support, and generations of islanders committed to saving lives along the rugged Donegal coast.

Their message is simple: when the pager goes off, they go.

Learn More or Support the RNLI

The RNLI is a charity that relies on public donations to operate its lifeboats and train its volunteer crews.

If you’d like to learn more or support their lifesaving work, visit:
 https://rnli.org

Featured in This Episode

Nora Flanagan
 Kieran O’Donnell
 John McCafferty

To learn more about the Beaver Island Irish Heritage Group, visit:

https://www.biihg.com/ 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:04

Welcome to The Tides That Tie, Exploring Two Islands, One Soul. A podcast that delves into the powerful connections between Beaver Island, Michigan, and Aaronmore, County Donegal, their histories, their cultures, their challenges, and the enduring spirit that unites them across the sea. Join your hosts Ron Gregg and Kevin Green as they uncover the stories, the traditions, and the voices that keep these islands forever linked. This is the Tides That Tie.

SPEAKER_03 0:52

Welcome to the podcast All Things Aaron Moore in Beaver Island. I'm Kevin Green. Out on the Atlantic edge of Ireland, beyond the Donegal Mainland, sits a small island with a long memory and a deep relationship with the sea, Aaron Moore. For more than 140 years, when the call has come from these waters, in storm and darkness and war and hope, a lifeboat has launched from this island. That lifeboat belongs to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, a charity founded in 1824 on one simple belief that no one should drown at sea. But institutions don't launch boats, people do. In this episode, you'll hear from three voices of the Aaron Moore Lifeboat Station. Nora Flanagan, historian, press officer, and first female crew member on the island, Kieran O'Donnell, the current full-time coxswain, and John McCafferty, launch authority and mechanic with more than 20 years of service. This is not just the story of rescues. It's the story of legacy, of responsibility, of pride, and what it means on a small island to answer the call.

SPEAKER_06 2:08

Two islands on so one people too home.

SPEAKER_02 2:16

My name is Noah Flanagan. I am the press officer for the RMO Lifeboat. I am also the station visitors officer. I was the first female crew member on the RNO Lifeboat, and I am celebrating 32 years with the institution. It's a charitable institution, and it was founded in England by a man named Sir William Hillary in 1824. He was also an island man, he came from the Isle of Wight at the foot of England. And he and several colleagues of his. Of course, it was a different time, a different era then. There was a lot of seafaring at the time. There was navies, there was pirates, there was all sorts of people going to sea. But there was no organization that would help to save people, as I say, in peril on the sea. So he and his friends decided to form this organization. And it's, as I say, a charitable organization. It is crewed by volunteers, and the same ESA still persists to this day. The first lifeboat came to Aaron Moore in 1883, and that was uh the RNLI had a look at where they would site a lifeboat around the north, northwest, northeastern coast, and they decided to put it in Aaron Moore because it covered a huge area at the time. Um to to facilitate the setting up of the lifeboat in Iron Moor. And the first boat that came here was named after uh Richard Van Deleur, that was the Van Delaur, an open boat crewed by men with a knowledge of the sea.

SPEAKER_03 4:37

From open wooden boats powered by muscle and wind to a seven class lifeboat worth two million pounds. The equipment has changed, but one thing hasn't. This is still a charity, still dependent on ordinary people giving what they can. Nora explains how the modern lifeboat came to an island like Aaron Moore.

SPEAKER_02 4:56

Aaron Ross Powell The Severn Class Lifeboat, which cost two million at the time, and that was in 2000, was partially funded by Myrtle Maud. She was an English woman whose husband was a fighter pilot in the Second World War, and they were very much involved with the R and LI wherever they lived. So that was absolutely essential in getting our lifeboat. Our lifeboat cost two million, but she actually donated one million towards the lifeboat. The rest was made up from public donations. In the middle of the of the country, there's fundraising groups. So people from all walks of life, and not just people around the coast, are have a dedication to the work that they are an ally does because it is a charitable organization. And you go around with buckets asking people just to put in a penny or two or whatever they can afford.

SPEAKER_03 5:52

If you want to understand the character of this station, you look to December 8th, 1940, wartime, two British destroyers forced a retreat, and a small open lifeboat launched into what many believed was certain death. This is the rescue that shaped Aaron Moore's identity.

SPEAKER_02 6:26

Called a Stalwick that went on rocks off Tory Island. Now she was accompanied by two destroyers, two British destroyers, because it was time of war. And when she went on the rocks, one of the the destroyers tried to help, but unfortunately the coxswain um suffered a head injury and they were called off. The second destroyer was perhaps asked to leave because there was a lot of U-boats in the area as well. So anyway, there's two big destroyers. And compare that to a small boat, 42 feet. Went out, they had to wait until morning. And the most horrendous weather conditions were very, very challenging. And you must remember these were open boats, and the crew uh they had oilskins, long oilskin coats on them, and long jackets, and very cumbersome Wellington boots and uh life jackets that were made of cork. So off they went anyway, and uh I remember talking to um Andrew Early, who I think Beaver Island people would be very familiar with, and he was saying he was watching the uh the lifeboat going over, and he says nobody is ever coming back again from that from that car. Anyway, they got over to the Stalwick and managed to establish um a British boy, which is a rope with a uh a life-saving ring on it, and got a few of the crew on board, and then the rope, the British boy broke several times. But they eventually managed to rescue most of the crew of the uh of the Stallwick and brought them into Burton Port. Excuse me. Um talking to a few people like the likes of Charlie Boyle, Charlie Dolly, who would have been a mechanic on the on the lifeboat, it was his father who was the coxswain of the boats uh that rescued the crew of the Stalwick. And uh he was saying that his father was saying they brought the crew into Burton Port and the crew of the lifeboat were so exhausted that they actually had to stay in Burtonport that night that they couldn't come back home. Anyway, they came back home, uh got back home the following day. And subsequently, for their heroism and bravery, Queen Wilhelmina from the Netherlands awarded the crew grow gold, silver, and bronze medals, and the RNLI awarded uh the crew gold silver and bronze medals as well.

SPEAKER_03 9:23

The technology may have advanced, the boats may be stronger, but the sea hasn't softened. And sometimes courage looks like staying on scene for 26 hours, chasing a man who refuses to give up.

SPEAKER_02 9:36

Another rescue that would have been quite arduous was in 2006 there was a British sailor um sailing around the British Island, Ireland, and he was doing it for various charities and ironically, one of them was the RNLI. He was a single-handed yachtsman, he only had the use of one arm, and uh he got into difficulty, there was a huge storm, and I think it was about 50, 60 miles northwest of um Ironmore. Um he had lost power, he had lost his GPS, and he was literally coming round in circles, and the lifeboat was uh tasked to help him. They didn't quite know where he was. He couldn't say he had got the message out that he wasn't in in trouble, but there was a fixed-wing aircraft from Kilros in Scotland that actually located him. And um they actually informed the lifeboat crew who uh got to him and uh tried to establish a tow rope there, and he was trying to catch the tow rope to to secure it to his boat. It was called that his boat was called the Nephilik. And unfortunately he went overboard. And I think some of the crew on the lifeboat said, Well, that's it. Now he they didn't know he only had the use of one arm as well. And after a while they could see this hands coming up the side of the Nephilim, and Keith hauling himself back into the boat again. So um that rescue lasted about 26 hours. They managed eventually to get Keith on board the lifeboat. He was suffering from hypothermia. Um, but anyway, he they managed to save him after 26 hours.

SPEAKER_03 11:35

The legacy of those rescues now rests in new hands. The boat is different, the training is different, the responsibility enormous. Today, when the pager goes off, the decision making sits with the coxswain. Here's Kieran O'Donnell.

SPEAKER_04 11:50

My name is Kieran O'Donnell. Um with the lifeboat now for 18 months, and I'm the full-time coxswain here at the station on the island. So um yeah. Took over the role from Jimmy Early uh a year last August and passed out as coxswain there last June. So six months in the coxswain full-time position. Coxswain is well, I suppose the short answer is he's the man who drives the boat. He drives the lifeboat when there's a call or emergency. But it's yeah, there's a lot more in it. There's um station management, crew management, boat maintenance.

SPEAKER_03 12:39

But no launch happens on instinct alone. There is a structure behind every shout, authorization, readiness, maintenance, coordination with the Coast Guard. John McCafferty is one of the people who makes that machinery work. My name is John McCafferty.

SPEAKER_05 12:54

Um I've been involved with the with the RNLI and RMore for around 20 years now. Um my corn role is it's actually a dual role at the moment. I'm a launch authority and I'm also a relief mechanic at at the station. So launch authority, um what that entails is when when there's a request to use the the asset, the SAR asset or the search and rescue asset, uh the local Coast Guard, which in our case is Mallonhead Coast Guard, contacts um one of the launch authorities and requests the use of the asset. Um so we then dependent on on various things, we then give permission to for use off of the Ironmore lifeboat, um which uh uh in nine cases out of ten is is of course allowed. Um I'm also a relief mechanic. Um I've been doing that role for roughly 15 years. Um what that entails is we have a station mechanic in Philip Macaulay, I'm sure you know. Um many years ago Philip had no relief, so I stepped in and trained as a mechanic there as well. So Philip could you know, could have his um his annual leave and his downtime and his weekends and so on. So um now I'm I'm glad to say we have a couple of relief mechanics in place.

SPEAKER_03 14:19

So what actually happens when a call comes in? When someone is in trouble 10 miles offshore, when Malinhead Coast Guard picks up the phone, here's how the lifeboat launches.

SPEAKER_04 14:30

The Coast Guard station will contact Jerry Early or one of his deputies. Jerry's our launch manager. He they'll contact him and say, uh, a boat's in trouble ten miles off or more. Are you able to go? And Jerry will say, I suppose he wrote a song about it, didn't he? I'll go. He'll be able to tell them, yes, we're we're capable, we have the crew, we're ready to go. So he'll have that information to hand if the boat, you know, if we come across something during maintenance, we might have to put the boat off service for a few hours until we get apart. So he'll know if the boat's on service, we have the crew, we can go. So he'll he'll tell them to put off the pages so that'll inform everybody of the shout. So yeah, we all make our way to the station. Jerry will call me to brief me on X, Y, and Z, what exactly we're going to. Come down, we get changed. I pick the crew, I'll brief the crew on what we're going to, what to expect. Do you need to wrap up, you know, take extra layers and heavy jacket, light jacket, stuff like that. And then we just launch, we open up the big doors here at the station, and we put our tractor and our boarding vessel into the water. We jump in, we transition across to the boat, and we get the boat ready to head away, basically. Um we get it started up, we do a few checks, and then typically from when the pagers go off until we're releasing the anchor on the lifeboat, it's 12 minutes. It's kind of like the average. If it's a medivac medical evacuation from the island, if we have to transfer somebody across to an ambulance after hours or at the weekend, more than likely it's first come, first serve. But if we have a storm and I need the experience, I can't just take the first ones that come because it might be all the younger ones, or so I will hand select on certain calls. I know if we're going to do something something grim for it might be a body recovery or whatever it might be that you mightn't want to take the younger crew with you. Just you may shelter them from some of the things you might encounter. So certain situations, yeah, you'll have to uh you'll have to pick.

SPEAKER_03 16:38

That's your decision.

SPEAKER_04 16:39

Yeah, that's my decision, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:41

It's easy to talk about procedures. 12-minute launch windows, crew selection, heavy jackets or light jackets, but none of that explains why they do it. For that, you have to hear what it feels like when it works.

SPEAKER_05 16:57

I love the sea. I was raised in the sea, and my heart is anywhere near the sea, uh, anywhere I've ever been, I've I've tried to be beside the sea. But yeah, anybody involved, you're in a lie, who comes back from a successful shout when you have, you know, we've lifted people out of the water, off boats, off cliffs, whatever sort of scenario it is. But when you take that person back to somewhere safe and land them on a pier and see their their families there or their kids there, and you know, you know, you I mean, you're smiling, but your soul is smiling that, you know, I brought that person away. I've helped that person come back to his family and he's gone home tonight because of something I helped with, you know, and there is no better feeling in the world. Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_04 17:40

It's an honor to be able to to be the person to go and help someone in their time of need. That's probably the biggest thing for anyone joining the group. You're doing it to be to be there for the coastline, the whole of Dunegulf. We have a massive area to our patches very big that we will cover. You do it for that reason, you know, for anybody who gets in trouble, but a lot of it is you're an islander.

SPEAKER_03 18:11

For some it's about the sea. For others it's about community. For most, it's both. Service on an island is personal because you're not just rescuing strangers, you're rescuing neighbours too.

SPEAKER_05 18:24

I think of of all the jobs I've ever done in my life, um, and there have been ups and downs in the role with the Ornali, um, the satisfaction you get from from the good that you can do on the good outcomes far outweighs anything else. And it is is a joy that you probably wouldn't feel from an awful lot of jobs. And that also with the sense that you're serving your community in such a respect, I think in such a respectful way. I mean, there's no greater love, as they say, than than serving like that. Um, you know, like I say earlier, a lot of people in Ireland would would get ill from time to time, and it can be a worrying, very, very worrying time for them um when they don't know the sort of protocols or the procedures we have in place to get people away. Um so when you when you come into that equation and you see how it works and you see how positively it affects them, it's it's uh it's amazing. And the feel-good factor from it is is something I just absolutely adore. Um yeah, that's that's what I would say to anybody who wanted to get involved. Obviously you're getting involved for your own reasons, but the good you can do um far outweighs any you know, training or hard work that you have to put in. It it's you get more from it than you put into, is what I'm trying to say, I suppose.

SPEAKER_03 19:51

And no one walks onto that boat casually. Training is relentless, standards are strict, commitment is expected. This isn't performative volunteerism, it's operational readiness.

SPEAKER_02 20:03

Once the volunteers are trained in a lot of the disciplines, they're allowed to go on board under supervision. They are put through their paces then on board, whatever they do, fiddling with ropes and fiddling with anchors and things like that. I don't really understand. Even though I was part of it's a long time ago. Then once they have completed their initial assessments, they are allowed to go on call-outs. And that takes about six months or so before you're allowed to go on a call-out. You can go on training exercises, which is ongoing training basically on board. So the training is just excellent.

SPEAKER_05 20:43

From just coming in and your initial join up, um, from the time you join up until you actually go live and you're given a pager, it can take it depends on the person, but it can take anything from I'd say a minimum about a year to two years. And as an active crew member, you're expected to do eight, eight exercises per year, and then be involved with twelve shouts per year. You know, so if somebody's been there, we'll say for five years, and shows up now and again, he's been there for one exercise, hasn't showed up to any shouts, you know, they're not going to remain active crew, so they're struck off. So it's really looking for commitment, and you know, that's really what it's all about at the end of the day. It's somebody who wants to be there, who's able to be there, and is able to put in the time.

SPEAKER_04 21:30

So typically we're out every two weeks. We try and get two to three exercises in a month, training exercises. So um yeah, this month we have three done already, and it's only the nineteenth of January, so we're ahead of our time. But we'll get another one in maybe next week where we have a lot of new starts, so they need extra training to, you know, help them along. So it's not a lot, but then you take in the commitments of shouts, you know, if we're tasked to do a Medivac. Is two hours. Um or uh go out to a boat, you know, a boat in difficulty or somebody missing or whatever the case may be. It it can be a big draw time-wise for people. We spent twenty-three hours in Donegal Bay in October searching for somebody who went overboard. In November we spent twelve or fourteen hours just off RMO here looking for a Navy personnel that fell off a carrier. Some of the shouts can be very long, time consuming, um, but that's what you sign up for, you know. So in the summertime we have eight and nine shouts a month. You're talking two or three hours per shout average, so it's it's quite a lot of you know, a lot of evenings, a lot of time taken up, you add in exercises then, and yeah, it it it does it it adds up.

SPEAKER_03 22:51

For most of its history, the lifeboat crew on Aaron Moor looked a certain way. Men, fishermen, brothers, fathers and sons, the knowledge of sea passed from one generation of men to the next. But that was never the full story.

SPEAKER_02 23:05

Like I said, it was always men with the knowledge of the sea who crewed the lifeboats. Um, but now it's a whole different story. Women are taking their part. They always took part in the RNA. They always helped to launch the boats. If there weren't enough men around to launch the boats, they helped launch the boats. And there's photographs, um, numerous photographs of women helping launch the boats. And then they got involved in fundraising, and of course, they always supported their their husbands, their brothers who volunteered on the lifeboats. Today it's different. Um there's a lot of uh female crew members. I was the first female crew member on the Airno Lifeboats, and uh the training at the time was on board, and I could never tie knots to anything that would help the boats safely anchor or anything like that. The then mechanic asked, John Alon asked if um there would be anybody interested in volunteering. He didn't reckon on the women volunteering and all things, so I went up and I asked him, Well, do you think I could go on fair play to him? He didn't faint. He said, Of course you can.

SPEAKER_03 24:19

The sea culture of Aaron Moore has changed. Once nearly every member grew up fishing. Now many are teachers, office workers, commuters. The instinct isn't automatic anymore. It has to be taught. And that transition hasn't been simple.

SPEAKER_05 24:34

I suppose in certain ways, most of the crew don't use the sea for work. But um that's that's one of the big, big changes we've seen here in the past 20, 30 years. Um, a lot of the old lads would have been fishermen, would have been spent their lives on on the sea, you know, new the sea inside out, whereas as the new people coming on board, they're they're mainly land-based. Some of them even work in the mainland and they don't work on the island, maybe are available at weekends. So it's it's changed an awful lot in that regard.

SPEAKER_03 25:03

Has that created any special challenges or difficulties to overcome?

SPEAKER_05 25:08

It it has, yes. Um it's something we speak about quite often. Um I'm the age I am, I'm in my 50s, and as a young man, um, you know, I spent some time fishing, fishing lobsters and uh various fish, but we were brought up in boats and small boats and knowing how to anchor and tie up and steer and all the rest of it was was it was second nature, you know, because you were in and out of boats all the time. Whereas that's not the case anymore. The young kids aren't brought up like that anymore here. They don't have the chance to, unfortunately, but um so now a volunteer joining a lifeboat, a lot of the time you're starting from scratch, they may not have spent any time on boats on the water. You're starting that a little bit further back and and bringing them up to speed. So it takes possibly takes a wee while longer.

SPEAKER_03 26:02

Do you find that islanders are able to overcome that gap of of not having that initial seamanship to get up to speed fully?

SPEAKER_05 26:10

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I I've seen that in the last couple of years since being more involved in bringing in um new crew. Obviously, anybody involved with the lifeboat really wants to be involved with the lifeboat, they're there for a reason, they're for their own reasons. Overall, that reason is for saving lives at sea. So they make every effort to to get themselves up to speed, learn the skills that are needed. But I've seen nothing that would h hold any of them back in in the last number of years. That's people with seagone skills and without. You know, they all they all do their utmost to to to get up to speed as quickly as possible. So we're blessed in that regard.

SPEAKER_04 26:50

So yeah, that's kind of the next major challenge in our in our history books is transitioning from even the likes of my father, all the people I mentioned before, they were all seagon, working people. They grew up on boats fishing, you know, fishing salmon, crab, lobster. They were out five, six months of the year on the water. That transition now is everybody's kind of office workers, working from home, school teachers, you know, they wouldn't typically spend a lot of time at sea. So the older crowd, everything came everything came naturally to them. They didn't need much training, you know, they was they just stood on the boat and done what they'd done naturally. Um but now you have to kind of fully train people in because the people don't really be on the sea around here anymore. So they need uh full guidance to get up to the standard that you need them at to encounter whatever you're gonna come across. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:01

Do you find that learning curve is is uh steep with uh the new folks that don't have that seaman ship experience? Um people seem to pick it up quickly.

SPEAKER_04 28:14

Yeah, they do pick it up quickly. It is but it is still a steep, a steep learning curve, you know. It's it's completely unnatural for them to be on a boat other than the ferry crossing. So yeah, when you get a boat that's rolling side to side and sometimes you have to strap yourself in with seat belts so you don't fall off the seat. You see it in the older crew, they would they would know how you need to stand in a certain wave and you know the younger crew might be holding on to the handles for dear life that kind of way. But at the same time, it doesn't take long for them to and that's the benefit of you know, the older crew are still there. We're you know, we can still take a lot from them, um the younger crew can to to get up to speed. Yeah. Yeah, so but no, overall, you know, there's nobody incapable coming onto the boat. They're willing to learn, they're willing to they're willing to uh get up to speed and do whatever needs to be done to to uh get trained in and the pager doesn't respect evenings or weekends or holidays.

SPEAKER_03 29:21

A Medevac may take two hours, a search may take twenty-three, and sometimes the hardest part isn't the C, it's the waiting.

SPEAKER_04 29:29

Yeah, it's been a pretty sad few years, so it has. And then that's tough on the crew then, you know, if you don't make it to somewhere in time, you know, it's kinda like if we if this happened or you know, if if if we could have got there quicker, could we save them? And you know, there's a lot of ifs and buts and but you can only do what you can do, you know. You're responding to somebody in their time of need, so yeah, it's kinda yeah, that's pretty much it. You can't you can't be everywhere at once, I suppose, you know. And we've such a vast coastline here. You know, for us to get to the outer edge of our area, I should it would be like an hour and twenty minutes. You know, it's an hour it's an hour to get to Glengon Kill, which is south of here. You know, if we had to go around to Telon, you're talking an hour and twenty minutes. And that's within our patch. But if somebody's in trouble, let's say Tielon, for example, you know, you feel helpless for that hour and twenty minutes until you get to the scene. Kind of like, geez, I wish I uh I wish I could speed things up here and get to get to the place.

SPEAKER_03 30:40

There are rescues that end with families reunited on the pier, and there are others. The one where the boat arrives and it's already too late. The ones that stay with the crew long after the engine shut down.

SPEAKER_05 30:54

You know, I can I could have seen the faces of the crews and how it's affected the crews and you know how it's affected all of us. And and you do you obviously learn from it, but um I don't think you know we could have done anything particularly better or or quicker or anything like that that would have made a difference. But it's still obviously you're you are there, you are the asset sent out to to make that difference, and when that difference can't be made, obviously sometimes you know it falls back on you and on your crew. Um and that can hit hard sometimes, you know. Um but like I say, you just you dust yourself off and try and learn if there's any learning to be done and get on with it and go on to the next one.

SPEAKER_03 31:36

And behind every launch, every gallon of fuel, every life jacket, every training exercise is something quieter. Fundraising committees, bucket collections, small donations, large donations, because the RNLI is not government funded. It survives because people believe in it.

SPEAKER_05 31:56

Yeah, as as much as um, you know, the lads and and girls and this and the and the crew are are amazing people that do an amazing job. There are so many other roles out with the crew who support what happens at the station. I mean, the station can't run, obviously, without funding. And as we know, the RNLI is a charity who which totally depends on donations. Um happy to say that we have a fundraising committee on the island who do a great work. And over I think over the last few years they've had record figures, which shows, I suppose, in another way, the support that the public has for the RNLI. And those roles, as far as I'm concerned, you know, people that are putting money into the bucket or into the pot or or giving checks or whatever however they're doing it, just as important. Because without them, we can't do we can't do anything. You know, you can't launch a boat without fuel, without equipment, and so on. So they allow us to go out and do what we have to do, and without them, you're you're stuck in port and you can't do anything. So just as important in my eyes.

SPEAKER_03 32:56

On Aaron Moore, the lifeboat is not just a service, it's a family story. Fathers and sons, mothers and daughters, generations who stood on the same slipway. And when John talks about legacy, he's not speaking metaphorically.

SPEAKER_05 33:12

We have fathers and sons, we have mothers and sons, we have fathers, daughters. My daughter Erin was there on the crew for a couple of years, and lots of other young people you know, their their mums or their dads, or you know, they're all there on the crew together. So it is, I suppose it's a family legacy thing as well. A lot of the people that are there had their had their dads or their grandfathers there as well. It's also a it's a pride thing, you know. It's we've always had a very steady, very capable crew and station on our moor, and obviously we want to see that continue, and we want to see it continue professionally and well ran and well crewed. So it's a it's a pride thing for the island as well. And I can't see that changing, to be honest. We we often go back to you know crew, crew numbers and all the rest, but we will always, I think, um make sure that that boat is fully crewed and fully ready and able to go on the water in in the case of uh search and rescue.

SPEAKER_03 34:12

From an open rowing boat in eighteen eighty three to a seven class lifeboat scanning a vast Atlantic patch, from oil skins and cork life jackets to GPS and twelve minute launch windows, the tools have changed. But the principle has it. When the call comes from the sea, Aaron Moore answers. The Royal National Lifeboat Institution was founded on the idea that strangers are worth saving. On Aaron Moore, they aren't strangers. They're neighbors, they're fishermen, they're sailors, they're families waiting on a pier, and sometimes they're the crew themselves. Because as John said, there's no better feeling in the world than knowing someone went home tonight because you helped. The boat will launch again in darkness and wind and uncertainty, and someone will stand at the helm. Because on this island, surrounded by the Atlantic, answering the call isn't extraordinary. It's expected.

SPEAKER_06 35:12

Blessed be we are to be two islands where one so.

SPEAKER_00 35:28

Oh wow. What an amazing legacy. Thank you to this month's guest, Nora Flanagan, Karen O'Donnell, and John McCafferty. And also thanks to Jerry Early for coordinating our interviews. To learn more or donate to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, go to rnli.org. That's rnli.org, or search the Aaronmore RNLI page on Facebook or Instagram. To learn more about the Beaver Island Irish Heritage Group, go to BIIHG.com. That's BIIHG.com. Links provided in our show notes. The Tides that Tie is sponsored by the Beaver Island Irish Heritage Group. Music provided by Ed Palmer and Rich Scripps, Jerry Early, John Gallagher, Ann Canahan, John Flanagan, Hillary Palmer, Cindy Cushman, and Ruby John. With special thanks to Kevin Boyle for our introduction voiceover. To learn more or support the storytellers behind the Tides that Tie, email us at tides that tie at BIIHG.com. That's Tides That Tie at B I I H G dot com. Copyright, 2026, Beaver Island Irish Heritage Group, all rights reserved.