Mel Cooper, a volunteer at Port Talbot Lifeboat Station, was rewarded for his dedication to the RNLI with a visit to Buckingham Palace on Tuesday 22nd of June.
Mel and his wife Margaret travelled to London to attend a garden party after being nominated after years volunteering with the RNLI, the charity that saves lives at sea.
Mel and Margaret first joined the RNLI as Shoreline members in 1983, before joining the fundraising branch in 1999. Since then Mel has been a great support at Port Talbot RNLI. He is always ready to help and enjoys being involved with everything within the station, from helping with launches to visiting schools and organisations to educate the public on sea safety.
He is also secretary of the fundraising committee as well as the Volunteer Lifeboat Press Officer at the station.
After his day of enjoying the sunshine at Buckingham Palace, Mel commented:
‘It was a great honour to be nominated and then invited to the garden party. We thoroughly enjoyed our day and couldn’t have had a nicer time.’
The skills, experience, time and interest that volunteers bring to the RNLI are invaluable. The RNLI are very grateful to all our fundraising, branch and station volunteers who work extremely hard to ensure that our volunteer lifeboat crew are able to continue to save lives at sea.
