THE new BBC 2 series Saving Lives at Sea is to feature some of the recent rescues carried out by Minehead’s volunteer lifeboat crew.

The 12-part run of one-hour programmes, which starts at 8pm tomorrow (Wednesday, August 16), looks at the work of the RNLI around the coasts of Britain and Ireland and follows the huge success of the first, shorter series last summer.

Blast! Films, which produced the 2016 series, has been recording and editing the programmes since February.

They will feature rescues carried out at more than 30 of the RNLI’s 600-plus stations, much of the time using footage captured during the operations by on-board or helmet cameras now in use at a number of them, including Minehead.

Among the sequences featuring the Minehead crew is the rescue of a woman who slipped off the cliff path at Hurlestone Point just before Christmas last year and was located and taken off after spending all night sheltering in a cave.

Another will feature a joint operation by the Minehead and Ilfracombe crews to rescue seven exhausted kayakers from the beach beneath Foreland Point, near Lynmouth.

Minehead RNLI chairman Bryan Stoner said the footage featuring the Minehead crew should provide people with a real insight into the challenges posed by the local coastline and tidal conditions.

“I think local people are going to be highly impressed with the skill and expertise of the Minehead crew and will be reassured that sea safety along this particular stretch of the British coastline is in the hands of such a capable team.”