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Coastguards have rescued a 'Captain Calamity' who took to the sea in a ramshackle raft he'd made himself.The mariner spent weeks knocking up the 'Robinson Crusoe' boat at his home from pieces of wood and a metal bedstead before towing it down to the beach.He was seen making final alterations to the catamaran contraption two days ago by worried coastguards who warned him against taking it to sea.
But the unnamed 38-year-old ignored their advice and launched the 6ft raft into the sea at Charmouth, Dorset, yesterday afternoon.A member of the public raised the alarm when the vessel soon got into trouble 450 yards from shore and began drifting west into the English Channel.The Lyme Regis lifeboat and coastguard team were called and had to tow the stranded sailor back to shore.The man had used two coffin-shaped boxes to make the twin hulls of the raft and tied a metal bedstead with a cargo net on top.
Graham Turner, of the Lyme Regis coastguard, said: 'We have known about this contraption on the beach for a few days.'The man was warned by coastguards not to take it to sea because it wasn't seaworthy but he went anyway. He took it out on its maiden voyage to go fishing off-shore.'We were alerted by a member of the public who saw him take the boat down to the water's edge.'A 999 call was made a short time later by the passer-by who was concerned the man didn't seem to know what he was doing.'At the time he launched there was a southerly offshore wind and the tide was going out. He was drifting to the west and there was no way he was going to make it back to Charmouth using the wooden paddles he had.'The lifeboat insisted on towing him back to the beach because he would have caused all sorts of grief had he continued.'We warned him against taking it to sea again but at the end of the day we have not got the authority and cannot stop him.' A spokesman for Portland coastguard said: 'It was an irresponsible thing to do, that lifeboat could have been needed for another emergency.'
