The International Maritime Rescue Federation (IMRF), the international charity preventing loss of life in the world’s waters, has delivered a high-level specialist workshop on Mass Rescue Operations (MRO) for a range of maritime emergency response officials in Bangladesh, in partnership with the Bangladesh Coast Guard.

The Bangladesh Coast Guard (BCG) is the maritime law enforcement authority in Bangladesh and this is the second MRO workshop that the IMRF has delivered with the organisation.

The training took place on Monday 28 May 2018 at the BCG headquarters in Dhaka, Bangladesh, with more than 40 officials from the Armed Forces Division, Ministry of Home Affairs, Ministry of Disaster Management, Army, Navy, Air Force, Border Guard Bangladesh, BSMRMU, Fire Service and Civil Defence, Department of Shipping, Chattogram Port Authority, Mongla Port Authority, Payra Port Authority, Bangladesh Shipping Corporation, Bangladesh Marine Academy (Chattogram), Marine Fisheries Academy, BIWTA, River Police and Ansar-VDP, all attending the workshop.

Maritime search and rescue saves lives – now is the time to nominate exceptional individuals and organisations for an IMRF Award.

The International Maritime Rescue Federation (IMRF) has launched the IMRF Awards 2018 and is calling for nominations and entries from around the world. The Awards are unique, in that they were specifically established to recognise and reward the selfless efforts of search and rescue (SAR) operators around the world, who make many sacrifices to saves lives at sea.

The IMRF Awards also showcase new search and rescue products, technologies and techniques that could help improve search and rescue operations and save more lives. This year’s Awards ceremony and dinner will be hosted by the Norwegian Society for Sea Rescue (RS) at their new state of the art training centre, RS Noatun near Horten in Norway, following the IMRF’s annual European Regional Meeting.

Gothenburg, Sweden, 4-6 September 2018

Building on the success of the first IMRF Mass Rescue Operation Subject-Matter Expert (SME) course, held in June 2017, a second course will be held at Chalmers University, in Gothenburg, Sweden, in association with the Swedish Sea Rescue Society (SSRS), from Tuesday 4th – Thursday 6th September 2018.

Applications for this course are now being accepted.

The UK P&I Club has made a significant donation to the International Maritime Rescue Federation (IMRF) to support its work developing resources, training and building preparedness for maritime mass rescue operations.

The IMRF is the international non-governmental organisation which works to develop and improve maritime search and rescue (SAR) capability around the world, preventing loss of life in the world's waters. Mass rescue operations, are defined by the International Maritime Organization, as being beyond normal search and rescue (SAR) capability and therefore of vital interest to anyone with a role in SAR planning and response.

Part of the UK P&I Club funding will provide essential support for the IMRF online resource library which brings together as much mass rescue operations (MRO) guidance material as possible. The online library (www.imrfmro.org) is free to use and available to SAR professionals around the world, the funding will update the information available, enabling SAR services to better plan and prepare for MRO situations.