A
lifeboat station was established in 1810 at Spurn Point with a crew supplied by
Hull Trinity House. Known as
Spurn Point Lifeboat Station, a decommissioned gun battery emplacement, last used in 1809, was requisitioned as the main lifeboat building and was also partly converted into the
Life Boat House Hotel. The crew of the lifeboat were billeted in
Kilnsea, up the coast, until 1819 when cottages were built adjacent to the life boat house. The Life Boat House Hotel was owned and operated by the master of the crew. Apart from selling drink and provisions, the master made a side income from loading gravel and sand onto passing ships. The land and money to fund the operation had been supplied by the local lord of the manor. He petitioned Trinity House to take up the offer of the land and supply a lifeboat to use at Spurn. This they did, engaging
Henry Greathead of
South Shields in building a ship with ten oars. In the early days of the rescue boat, the mood of the crew at Spurn was sullen as they were not paid too well and were at the mercy of the master who ran the inn to provide what food and drink they needed. Locals from up the coast would come to load ships with gravel and sand, which they did brandishing revolvers, threatening the crew members, who viewed the enterprise as taking away their self-sufficiency. In 1811, the master wrote to Trinity House to complain about this "Law of the Dunes" as he labelled it, to which they had no legal recourse, with the nearest officials miles away. In December 1823, a fierce storm worked the ropes loose on the lifeboat and it capsized. It was ruined and needed replacing. Something similar occurred 60 years later in 1883, again after a particularly stormy night, the crew discovered that their lifeboat had been loosed of its moorings during the storm. This time it was safe and was later found drifting off the island of
Texel, off the coast of the Netherlands. Between 1908 and 1911, the station came under the aegis of the Humber Conservancy Board, who argued that the lifeboat station and crew should be handed over to the RNLI. For their part, the RNLI were reluctant to take on the crew as they were paid, which went against its policy of having volunteers. Eventually, these issues were sorted out and the RNLI assumed control in 1911. In 1919, the first motorised boat, the
Samuel Oakes (ON 651) arrived on station, and in 1924, the station name was changed from Spurn Point to
Humber Lifeboat Station. not an easy task as the sail wagon had no working brake. Due to the remoteness of the station, its restricted access (by road from the north) and the dangerous waters around this part of the east coast, the crew were on-site full time and were the only full-time paid RNLI All-weather lifeboat crew in the United Kingdom. The station was one of nine RNLI lifeboat stations situated along the
Yorkshire Coast and the most southerly of them all. Up until 2012, the families of the crew lived in cottages on Spurn Head adjacent to the lifeboat station, but a decision was taken to have two crews revolving through a roster and so the families moved to new accommodation in Kilnsea. As the spit of land is prone to breaches, this was also viewed as in the best interests of the families of the crew members. Latterly, the families had been housed in cottages built in 1975 to replace the row of houses first built in 1819. These were demolished when the seven new houses were built at a cost of £100,000. The retaining wall built to hold the sea back from the domestic area still survives fulfilling its intended purpose. From August 2012 to 2023, the two crews rotated through a shift of six days on and six days off. The lifeboat was moored at the end of a pier that sets out into the
Humber Estuary (westwards from Spurn Head) rather than a traditional launch down a ramp into the sea (which is on the eastern side of Spurn Head). This location has been described as being in the
lee of bad weather, thereby providing a safer place to set off from. The crew have pushbikes to cycle down to the end of the pier and then use a boarding boat to get to the lifeboat. Despite some buildings being erected to launch the lifeboat, even from the early days, it was recognised of the difficulties in launching the boat from land, so it has been traditionally moored away from the coastline. A traditional lifeboat house with slipway was built in 1923 and used up until 1977, but it fell into disuse with bigger lifeboats arriving, that were better moored afloat. The slipway and lifeboat house were demolished in 1995. The Humber Lifeboat has an operational area that covers the Humber estuary to
Immingham Dock, south along the coastline to
Skegness, northwards to
Bridlington and up to a out to sea. This overlapped with the Lifeboat to the south and the Lifeboat to the north and to other rescue agencies along the river. The and lifeboats were the next nearest all-weather lifeboats along the east coast. In February 2023, issues were found following a routine inspection of the infrastructure of the station. On the grounds of the cost and health & safety reasons, and with consideration of the continuing coastal erosion and difficulties with access, the decision was taken to permanently relocate the boat and crew from Spurn Point to
Grimsby, on the south side of the Humber estuary, where there was a second base for the lifeboat at
Grimsby Docks, previously used temporarily in certain weather conditions. Operations were transferred in June 2023. On 31 May 2025, the RNLI finally closed the chapter of their presence at Spurn Point, handing over the remaining station buildings to the
Yorkshire Wildlife Trust. Now with no access difficulties, and in line with all other All-weather lifeboat stations, Humber Lifeboat Station will gradually revert to a primarily volunteer crew. First broadcast on 25 January 2026, the work of Humber lifeboat Station and crew was featured, when they hosted
Guy Martin as a trainee crew member, for the TV programme
Guy Martin:Proper Jobs. ==Notable rescues==