Episode 3

The lifeboat crews are on call all year round, but it is in the summer months when they are at their busiest. While the crowds that flock to the coast relax and soak up the sun, the lifeboat crews and lifeguard teams are on high alert. In the Irish resort of Skerries, the pagers bring the crew running to the station when strong winds sweep a teenager on a paddleboard out to sea and towards the busy shipping lanes of the Irish Sea.

In the Bristol Channel, among the many yachts taking advantage of a fresh summer breeze, one loses a crew member overboard. The volunteers of Portishead lifeboat face a race against time to bring him back to shore before hypothermia takes hold.

And while the crowds are heading home at the end of a busy summer’s day in Cleethorpes, two 13-year-old girls find themselves alone, cut off and at risk of drowning on a sandbank rapidly disappearing under a fast-rising tide.