Lifeboat launched to rescue dolphins off Burntisland beach

The Kinghorn lifeboat crew helped rescue dolphins off Burntisland beach on Saturday night.

RNLI volunteers rushed away from their annual barbecue to prevent a number of common dolphins becoming stranded on the beach.

They were called in to help British Divers Marine Life Rescue personnel who had been battling since 3pm to coax the animals back to deeper water after they became stranded at Pettycur beach.

Helmsman Mark Brown said: ‘This was a different sort of callout for us this evening. We were initially asked to look for a distressed dolphin off Lammerlaws point which the onshore teams had lost sight of. We then took two BDMLR divers onto the lifeboat to assist with coaxing a second dolphin out of Burntisland Bay. We managed to successfully get it to swim to deep water offshore, and this gave it the best chance of survival.

‘Our final task was to search the beach area from Sandhills Caravan site, westwards, back to Burntisland, for a third animal. There was no sign of it, so hopefully it made it back to deeper water itself.”