All Coastguard personnel involved in SAR operations on agricultural land are being asked to ensure that both they and their vehicles are fully decontaminated both pre and post operations, as appropriate, (MAFF approved disinfectants are being used in decontaminating personnel and vehicles).

All normal patrols
have been ceased

The charity has decided to cancel its plans to hold a series of public meetings promoting its pilot beach rescue scheme and an inland water rescue service this summer on beaches and large expanses of inland water in the UK.

The pilot schemes will still go ahead but the public meetings, scheduled to be held this month in Cornwall for beach rescue and in Lowestoft for inland waters, will now be held later.

Michael Vlasto, the RNLI's Operations Director said, 'While we have a responsibility to inform the public and our supporters of our plans to extend our lifesaving skills, I think we have a greater responsibility to the rural communities, and the hardship they are suffering at the moment, not to increase any potential risk by encouraging people to travel unnecessarily'

The RNLI has also cancelled a major coastal conference and other events are being reviewed.

The beach rescue pilot, due to be run on five popular south coast and west country beaches this summer, aims to save more lives by ensuring a seamless rescue service for the public from the beach to the open sea, with the RNLI operating and managing a beach rescue lifeguard service. The beaches are in Bournemouth, Poole, Weymouth, Newquay and Whitsand Bay in Cornwall.

The inland waters pilot aims to provide a rescue service on large expanses of water and is already well under way on Lough Erne in Northern Ireland, where lifeboat crews are currently being recruited and trained for the first inland station to be called the Enniskillen Lifeboat. There are proposals to carry out pilot schemes in Suffolk and in the Lake District, subject to negotiations with local authorities and others.