Jurien Bay Marine Rescue welcomes new boat ahead of busy summer holidays

Jurien Bay Marine Rescue is receiving an early Christmas present this week, with a new 7m rescue vessel joining its ranks ahead of the busy summer holiday boating season.

Fully funded by the State Government, rescue 2 will be named and blessed this Saturday morning at the Jurien Bay Marina boat ramp.

Jurien Bay Marine Rescue commander Christine Heu said adding a second recue vessel to its arsenal would significantly improve incident response times.

“We’ve had times where we have had five rescues in one day so we have had to tell people out there to hold on before we can get them,” Ms Heu said.

“Instead of going by sea, we can travel by road, which will be faster to deploy down to Cervantes, Lancelin, Leeman or Port Denison.”

Jurien Bay Marine Rescue ran a competition at Jurien Bay District High School asking students to come up with the best name for its new vessel, with the winner to be announced on Saturday.

Ms Heu said rescue 2 would be able to tow small recreational boats and dinghies.

She said the boat was supposed to be ready months ago, but shipping problems had caused delays.

With the boating season up on us, Ms Heu asked all boaties to log on and log off so marine rescue is aware of people’s location and can cut down response times.

“Wear your lifejacket and make sure the safety equipment on your boat are ready to go and all maintained,” she said.