Coastguard Gen 3

History

COASTGUARD, MARINE RESCUE on the sides, roof spot lamps, a bonnet spare and a bumper winch, photographed outside a coastguard station; the Flickr record places the print in north-west London around 2010.

Through the 1970s and 1980s Coastguard's auxiliary rescue companies were equipped with short-wheelbase 4×4s to carry cliff-rescue and search gear along the coast paths: dark blue Series IIIs with yellow roofs so they could be spotted from the air and the sea, a coastguard crest on the doors and MARINE RESCUE lettering on the body. A259 SYM is one of those, an Shorty hard top registered in 1983–84 with a spare on the bonnet, spot lamps at the roof corners and a winch on the bumper for hauling rescue lines. The Flickr photograph shows it parked beneath an H.M. COASTGUARD sign at a station house: dark blue body and wheels, yellow roof with H.M. COASTGUARD in black along its sides and front, MARINE RESCUE in red on the hard-top sides, a pale waist stripe, the crest on the doors, chrome spot lamps at the front corners of the roof, a small blue lamp above the grille, the winch and a white A259 SYM plate. Corrected at review: the door badge is the Coastguard crest (crowned octagon with the CG monogram) and MARINE RESCUE is in plain red.