Search and Rescue.

Coast Guards, Lifeboats.

Every nation that has a Sea or a coastline, water has a boat and air rescue service of some kind. Big nations have coastguards, while smaller one just have a rescue service. The UK-Eire share the RNLI and Trinity lights. 

Equipment is made up of cutters and helicopters, while on the small scale Zodiac types. The RNLI have a series of their own publicly financed dedicated rescue boats. The Sikorsky Sea king and the Mil Mi-14/17 are the main stay of the worlds rescue fleets, because they have long range flying. Today are are a whole host of newer types becoming available.

The main aims are to get people out of the water, off boats and ships, which are either sinking or they are badly injured. Meanwhile helicopters serve to work with inshore mountain rescues and medivac.

Hovercraft.

The exciting days of the Dover to Calais hovercraft have now gone, replaced they say by the Channel tunnel rail link to France. But I think that this form of transport would still be viable. The hovercraft was much faster than the conventional ferry, because it skimmed over the Calais sands. 


Today we see that the RNLI have found value in smaller machines for rescue work on the sands off Avon and Somerset, while others work the Dee estuary between NE-Wales and the Whirral. 


Many military versions of the hovercraft were built in the former Soviet union. But alas another British invention seems to be put to the side lines, because of politics?