Calling on Kildare! Help fund a new lifeboat

Cill Dara will be a D class lifeboat. The D class is known as the workhorse of the RNLI fleet. And with good reason. It’s fast, tough and versatile. And crucially, for the type of rescues the Wexford volunteers frequently carry out, it can get to places larger lifeboats can’t. The shifting channel around the local harbour is deceptive, and it’s the crew’s job to ensure that deceptive doesn’t equal deadly. When a person is in trouble, the agile, shallow-bottomed D class is their best hope.

A kind donation from you towards the €117,000 needed will help make the lifeboat Cill Dara a reality. And make you a lifesaver. 

‘To do this, we depend on the countless others who have our backs – that includes the understanding loved ones we leave at a moment’s notice, the shore crew who help us launch, and kind folks like the people of Kildare. So many people visit Wexford for holidays and day trips, and it means so much to us to have support from other communities. We can't thank you enough.

‘The D class is the reason we’ve been able to help 244 people in need since our station opened in 2002. And with your help, we’ll hopefully soon be equipped with a new D class – a lifeboat fit for the future. By helping to fund Wexford’s new lifeboat – due to be named Cill Dara in honour of the generous people of Kildare who are doing so much to raise money for it – you’ll play a part in ensuring that local volunteers are able to launch for years to come.’

Damien Foley
Helm
Wexford Lifeboat Station

How your gift will help the volunteers

As an inflatable inshore lifeboat, the D class excels in shallower water and big surf. With their new lifeboat, Cill Dara, Wexford lifesavers will be able to:

• rely on a dependable new craft, so they can launch time and again
• reach people swiftly – the D class has a top speed of 25 knots
• venture to areas inaccessible to our all-weather lifeboats, such as inside caves and close to rocks.