A DWYFOR lifeboat station helped rescue 19 lives in 2016 - a rise of over 500 per cent on the previous year.

Overall 50 people returned home to their families after being saved by RNLI crews across the north Wales coast last year.

Lifeboat crews from Flint to Aberystwyth launched 536 times in 2016, a 15 per cent increase in launches compared to the previous year.

The reason for the callouts varied from machinery failure, searching for missing people, rescuing those in danger of drowning and rescuing people cut off by the tide.

The number of lives saved by Criccieth RNLI rocketed in 2016 as they saved 19 lives compared to three lives the previous year – the majority of those were coastal walkers cut off by the tide.

A particularly difficult call-out for the charity’s volunteers last year was when Barmouth and Aberdyfi RNLI joined a multi-agency search after two teenage boys visiting Barmouth from Birmingham got into difficulty swimming in the sea in August.

Tragically both teenagers, Waseem Al-Muflehi and Yahye Mohamed, lost their lives after getting into difficulty in the water.

As a result of this tragic incident Birmingham City Council approached the charity, along with other organisations, to try and help avoid a similar tragedy on the coast again this summer.

The RNLI subsequently announced that they have formed a new working partnership with Birmingham City Council as the City make water safety education a priority across Birmingham schools in 2017.

Read the full story in this Thursday’s north editions of the Cambrian News