Yacht Dismasted in Container Ship Collision

[Brief] The UK’s Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) reported Sunday that a yacht was dismasted in a collision with a container ship off Ramsgate.

The Ramsgate Lifeboat center launched on Sunday morning to render aid to a small single-handed yacht which had collided with a box ship 20 nm off the coast of Kent, in the English Channel.

A second small craft stood by to relay information to the Coastguard, as the dismasting had taken out the yacht's radio. 

[NB: for the RNLI, a lifeboat is a 50-foot powered rescue vessel, not a SOLAS lifeboat.]

The yacht was not taking on water, and the lifeboat crew determined that it was safe to tow it back to shore.

The yacht's owner reportedly refused to leave his craft to transfer over to the rescue boat. 

A Coastguard helicopter stood by at the scene until the yacht was under tow.

The Marine Accident Investigation Branch is looking into the cause of the collision. The weather observations at Ramsgate on Sunday morning showed mist and light rain.

RNLI is a charitable, non-profit lifesaving force with 350 rescue boats located around the British Isles; its volunteers and full-time lifeguards have been saving seafarers in UK waters for nearly 200 years.