Cape Town - High school pupils will be provided with valuable motor boat handling skills and an official qualification thanks to the donation of a rescue craft donated to the National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI) by a family who lost their son, along with two other teenagers at sea.
Named ‘Sean Day’ in honour of the significant contribution South African born USA-based Day, chairman emeritus of the Teekay Corporation, the 4.7m Rigid Inflatable Boat (RIB) – donated by the NSRI to the Lawhill Maritime Educational Trust (LMET) – has made to high-school based maritime education in South Africa.
It was unveiled by the international maritime leader godson, Sebastian Hamsher, while Day’s wife Ginny and two of his daughters, attended the naming ceremony via Zoom.
The NSRI-donated RIB is the second vessel to be named after Day.
In 2019, a large LNG carrier was named ‘Sean Spirit’ in Korea.
The ‘Sean Day’– which will be based at False Bay Yacht Club in Simon’s Town – will be used to enhance the skills of maritime students who have, for the past few years, benefited from a Personal Survival Training course provided by the NSRI, in association with the SATS General Botha Old Boys’ Bursary Fund.
The programme aims to equip students with maritime skills at an early age and, in so doing, open the way for them to progress into a formal sea-going career.
Acquiring small boat handling skills and a skipper’s ticket, while at school, also potentially increases the students’ post-school employment prospects, particularly in the marine tourism and related sectors, said Lawhill Maritime Educational Trust.
In his recent Port Pourri column on the naming of the rescue craft , Brain Ingpen said: “Although the RIB is of course a much smaller vessel, naming her after this amazing man encapsulates deep respect for a humble, yet dynamic leader in world shipping who has done so much for Lawhill’s young people.”
The naming ceremony can be viewed on https://youtu.be/sDa_JoM3CzY
Cape Times