amelia LUCK

Community and Voluntary Action, Maritime

Suggested by Rosie Minns

Amelia Luck is the first female helm at the RNLI Lifeboat Station in Fowey, one of only three female helms in Cornwall.

Amelia joined Fowey RNLI as a volunteer lifeboat crew member, aged 17, in 2017. Since then Fowey’s volunteer lifeboat crew have saved 16 lives and aided 335 people in trouble at sea. Amelia has personally attended 134 training and live lifeboat launches, of which 36 were actual rescue incidents, clocking up a total of over 355 volunteer hours at sea during this time.

When asked how she feels to be the first female helm in Fowey lifeboat history, Amelia said: ‘I don’t really think of it like that, I see myself as just another helm. I don’t think there’s any difference, no-one makes me feel any different here and it’s all very inclusive. One of the female trainers that I had at the RNLI college in Poole said to me that we can do anything the guys can do, we’ve just got to go about it in different ways sometimes. I can do exactly the same as the men and I don’t get treated any differently. It’s great to be the first female helm at Fowey but I think of myself as the same as the others. We’re just one crew really.’

Training to be helm meant that Amelia had to take control of her learning and push herself to train which she found very different from school.

When she’s not volunteering for the RNLI Amelia is doing an apprenticeship in business management. She also works as a Harbour Patrol officer during the summer season in Fowey Harbour.

Rosie says, “I am full of admiration for the RNLI in general. One of my earliest memories is of being rescued at sea! From the age of 3 - 6 we lived in Malaya and often went sailing. There were many small islands you could land on, squalls and thunderstorms were frequent. I have a vivid memory of having to be rescued from one of these islands because of bad weather - ending up being ferried back to Singapore on board a ship.”

rnli.org