A LIFEBOAT operations boss fears the summer “will only get busier” during the holidays after an action-packed week of call-outs.

Over the past week, crews at Harwich RNLI were called out to help a 37-year-old with a broken ankle, a young woman who was having a seizure on board a barge and to search for a missing person.

The week began when the crew was alerted to a fisherman falling overboard seven miles off Felixstowe, close to Sealand.

By the time they arrives, the casualty had been pulled from the water by a fellow crew member aboard the fishing boat, after being in the sea for five minutes.

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A frantic day then saw the crew called out three times in seven hours, beginning with a request to assist paramedics after a 37-year-old woman had broken her ankle on Bawdsey Beach.

The pagers sounded again at just gone midnight after reports of a young woman having a seizure aboard a sailing barge.

When they got to the station, the barge was already alongside Ha’penny Pier, with paramedics in attendance.

Using a specialist stretcher the crew were able to assist the paramedics in getting the casualty safely transferred from the barge’s sleeping quarters below deck to the waiting ambulance, which then took the young woman to Colchester Hospital for further assessment.

Harwich RNLI lifeboat operations manager Peter Bull said: “Last month was the busiest July since 2015, with 23 call-outs for the Harwich volunteers who have responded to 68 requests for help so far this year.

“We fear it will only get busier during the summer holidays.”