Join our School Holidays competition!
Leave a CommentWe are excited to announce our first coloring in competition for the upcoming Autum school holidays for our Northern Beaches young boaters. Follow this link for the details: Enter Here.
We are excited to announce our first coloring in competition for the upcoming Autum school holidays for our Northern Beaches young boaters. Follow this link for the details: Enter Here.
A huge congratulations to Marine Rescue Broken Bay Unit Commander, Jimmy Arteaga who was awarded Citizen of the Year by Northern Beaches Council for the Australia Day 2024 Awards.
Our Broken Bay unit completes its new build with the assistance of the CYCA SOLAS Trust
Congratulations to our new MRNSW Broken Bay life membership recipients, Mr. Ron Carr (left) and Mr. Vic Lawrence (right). Both of these gentlemen have been instrumental in training our members, performing on-water rescues, and keeping our vessels operational week in and week out.
Our Broken Bay unit is a better unit as a result of these two members time and dedication.
Construction has been completed and the plaque has been unveiled, marking the official opening of a new $1.215 million Marine Rescue Broken Bay base.
Member for Pittwater Rob Stokes said the new facility, in Rowland Reserve on the shores of Pittwater, has been developed thanks to $915,000 from the NSW Liberal and Nationals Government’s four-year investment of $37.6 million in Marine Rescue NSW, a $200,000 commitment by Northern Beaches Council and a $100,000 Community Building Partnerships grant.
The new facility includes a large training and meeting space, ample storage for rescue equipment, offices, amenities, kitchen facilities, a wet area for boat crews and access for volunteers living with disability.
Marine Rescue NSW Deputy Commissioner Alex Barrell thanked the Government for its support in developing the new base.
“This funding has boosted our rescue capability on Pittwater and Broken Bay, and ensured our volunteers have facilities designed and equipped for modern emergency management,” Deputy Commissioner Barrell said.
“Pittwater and Broken Bay are some of the busiest boating areas in NSW, and these new facilities will help ensure our volunteers are rescue ready should an emergency arise.”
Commander of the Broken Bay Unit, Jimmy Arteaga, said the new building was the culmination of extensive planning and input by the unit’s volunteers to ensure it met their needs now and well into the future.
“This new building provides a significant improvement to our ability to train and undertake operations, as well as providing our members with a safe and secure working environment,” Mr Arteaga said.
“I’m grateful for the support of the NSW Government and Northern Beaches Council and confident these first-rate facilities will also help encourage new members to join our mission of saving lives on the water.”
With thanks to Northern Beaches Council and Marine Rescue NSW, the construction of our new base is expected to take just under 12 months to complete.
Our Broken Bay build is coming along nicely and we estimate to reach the closeup millstone late November before the internal fitout process begins.
Our new BB21 Rescue vessel was delivered to the Broken Bay unit in late June 2022.
Over the month of July, a dedicated team will setup the new rescue vessel to become operational by the end of the month ensuring all members are inducted and are familiar with the operations of the new vessel.
We expect the new BB21 Rescue vessel will be ready for actively duty in August 2022 for rescues.
After an exhaustive 3 years of consultation, searching for grants, seeking approvals and engaging the community, the Marine Rescue Broken Bay unit base, rebuild project is about to begin with demolition work scheduled for June 6th 2022.
Over the last 3 weeks, our Broken Bay members have been diligently working to relocate our operations to our new temporary accommodation located at the Bayview boat ramp car park.
Over the next 8 months, a dedicated purpose built building will be constructed with thanks to the Northern Beaches Council and Marine Rescue NSW to provide a fantastic community building where we can continue our mission of ‘Saving Lives at Sea’
We will continue to provide update photos and stories as the construction progresses.
Our Broken Bay members received the opportunity to attend the Toll ACE Training Centre to refresh their in water survival skills on Friday 1st of April 2022.
Our members began the skills by completing a thorough theory refresher to set the scene for the in water activities. Once the theory was completed, it was time to get wet!!
Our members began the pool session by completing a jump from a high platform into the water. Once in the water, members completed set drills such as deploying lifejackets, survival in the water alone, in a group and swimming together to manage unconscious or hurt crew.
After completing the basic skills, we moved into the more advanced skills such as operating life rafts, simulating helicopter extraction from the water and finally simulating getting out of a down aircraft in the water, all while the pool simulated high seas, poor sea state and helicopter down drafts.
Ideally, we never want our members to have to use any of these skills but a refresher is always a great opportunity to put into context of the dangers and risks our members face helping our community on the water.
All attending members had a great time and took a piece of knowledge to help them and their fellow crew members.
A big thankyou to our ACE trainers and members for giving up their time.
Congratulations to Duncan Watts who today successfully passed his Leading Crew assessment. MRNSW Leading Crew are responsible for coordinating and managing inshore rescues not to mention managing the safety of the rescue vessel and it’s crew. A big achievement considering all the Covid hurdles.
Andrew Majewski Deputy Unit Commander of the Broken Bay unit (left) was on hand to present Duncan (right) with his new rank.