Rescue services all out for a duck
Published: September 11, 2006
It must be a first even for Wisden: a lifeboat and rescue helicopter called to attend a cricket match.
But this was no test match at Lords or the Oval; not even a local affair on the village green.
The venue was the Skate Bank sand spit in the Inner Moray Firth. It only appears every 80 years or so with a mixture of very low tides and high pressure weather systems.
Members of the local Chanonry Sailing Club had set out to recreate a legendary cricket match which was said to have taken place on the sandbank in the 1920s. But they did not expect it to lead to a coastguard rescue.
Olivia Robinson, an experienced dinghy sailor who has just left Fortrose Academy and is now heading off to Glasgow University, said: “We hoped that the sand bank would surface due to the tide being at its lowest for 25 years. But the charts have not been updated since 1918, so there was a chance that the bar had moved or shrunk. We decided it was worth investigating.”
Olivia and Lachlan McKeggie, her school friend and fellow sailing enthusiast, recruited two others, Olivia’s mother Helen, a local doctor, and Lachlan’s girlfriend, Lynne Dardine-Jones.
The tide was to be at its lowest at 8.10am on Saturday. A unique combination of high pressure, lunar cycle and calm seas meant that there was a good probability of Skate Bank appearing.
So, in these ideal conditions of calm sea and steady breeze (force three) and having left full details of where they were going with Helen’s husband, Grenville, they set sail.
As they breakfasted on board, Skate Bank, which is roughly half way between Fort George in the east and the Kessock Bridge in the west, finally exposed itself.
With a teddy bear as wicket keeper, they started the game as Olivia recalled yesterday:
“There was about 500m by 250m of sand out of the water, enough for a game of cricket. The pitch was waterlogged and, unfortunately, as the wicket has been covered for 80 years it didn’t take spin very well. We bowled a few balls and mum was out for a duck.”
However, unknown to them, their overarm exertions had been misconstrued by a passer-by on the shore.
Ms Robinson said: “When safely on the way home we suddenly noticed the rescue helicopter, and then the inshore lifeboat from North Kessock searching the Skate Bank area. Having realised they were looking for us, we gave the internationally recognised sign that we were OK and they just checked that was the case and left.
“Somebody bowling and us all jumping up and down, apparently in the middle of the Moray Firth, is clearly open to misinterpretation. We are grateful that the system works and had we been in trouble someone on the shore was worried enough to do something about it. But this time it was not necessary.”
John McFarlane, a member of the local coastguard team, had dashed to the shore with all lights flashing on the rescue Land-Rover: “When I got to Chanonry Point the helicopter was overhead and the lifeboat patrolling and I met Grenville who was stroking his chin. He said: ‘I am afraid my family may be responsible for all this.’
“We had received a report that there were people in trouble on the sand bar. Cricket was not an explanation which immediately sprang to mind. Maybe it should have.”
The saga of Skate Bank will mark the 50th anniversary of the Chanonry Sailing Club.
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