Volunteer crew members of Courtmacsherry RNLI today laid a wreath at the site of the wreck of the RMS Lusitania to mark the 108th anniversary of the sinking of the famous ocean liner.

The wreath-laying at the site of the wreck, 12 miles off the Seven Heads coastline in West Cork, is an annual tradition of the station.

Coxswain Mark Gannon and crew Dara Gannon, Denis Murphy, Dean Hennessy, Stuart Russell and Conor Dullea today launched the station’s new all-weather lifeboat, the ‘Val Adnams’ and travelled to the location to commemorate the tragic sinking.

Of the countless callouts in the station’s long history, perhaps the most notable occurred on this day 108 years ago.

That fateful day in 1915, the Lusitania, a British Cunard line ocean liner was on passage from New York when she was torpedoed and sunk by a German U-boat south of Courtmacsherry Bay, with the loss of 1,201 lives.

The Courtmacsherry RNLI volunteer lifeboat crew were alerted to the tragedy.

The crew rowed the 'Kezia Gwilt' lifeboat 11 miles out to the wreck because there was no wind to sail her with, and helped rescue survivors.

Lifeboatmen involved on that day included Tim Keohane, father of Antarctic explorer Patrick Keohane.

In 2015 the lifeboat crew and residents of Courtmacsherry village, many of whom are related to the original 1915 RNLI Courtmacsherry harbour lifeboat crew who were called to service, staged a re-enactment of that heroic row by the then lifeboat crew to the site of the Lusitania.