14th June 2018. The volunteer Watchkeepers from the Gosport National Coastwatch Institution Station recently held their 100th training meeting which also neatly coincided with the tenth anniversary of their lookout station at Fort Blockhouse becoming operational in June 2008. A large majority of the 70 or so current members of the volunteer watchkeeping team were able to attend this important milestone meeting and they were also joined for the evening by the charity’s National Chairman, Lesley Suddes, who had travelled down from HQ especially for the occasion. 

Ms Suddes, who is no stranger to Gosport having served at HMS Dolphin during her former naval career, presented the Station’s first two 10 Year Long Service Awards to Watchkeepers Andy Krasun and John Sherrington. She then gave an interesting address outlining the progress made nationally since NCI opened its first lookout station at Bass Point in Cornwall back in 1994. She was also very complimentary of the highly professional standards maintained locally by the Gosport Watchkeepers in providing safety surveillance over the busy waters of the Eastern Solent and Portsmouth Harbour.

The Gosport NCI Station has itself come a long way since it first became operational on 1st June 2008 with just half a dozen watchkeepers on duty at weekends. They are now able to maintain daytime watches seven days a week, 364 days of the year and have become a vital element of the UK Maritime Search & Rescue Service. The National Coastwatch Institution has effectively become the local “eyes and ears” of HM Coastguard in recent years and, besides often being the first to identify and report people in difficulties along the coast, they are also able to provide radio checks, up to the minute weather reports and other vital information to passing yachtsmen who can contact them directly on Marine VHF Channel 65 when they are within range during duty hours using the call sign “Gosport NCI”