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Photograph of Dave Graeme wearing the traditional gansey

Dave Graham

Dave belongs to: Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade

Dave works for a marine engineering company. Before this he worked in the merchant navy as an engineer. He joined the Tynemouth Volunteer Life Brigade in 1991.

Dave was interviewed by Carl Greenwood on 15 December 2005. The interview took place at the Interviewee's kitchen and lasted 37 minutes and 44 seconds.

Photograph of Dave Graeme wearing the traditional gansey
Photograph of Dave Graeme wearing the traditional gansey

Other personal equipment

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"I’ve gone out and bought, like most brigadesmen, you go out and buy your own gear"

I’ve gone out and bought, like most brigadesmen, you go out and buy your own gear, the patch pocket trousers that we fit over the boots, the thermal layers of underwear, the gansey that I have, because I’m one of the lucky ones and the infamous utility belt, which started, started off as a belt initially, basically to keep a radio on and a penknife, I mean, you know, everybody, you need a penknife- every sailor always has a penknife, so it was penknife, radio, torch, binoculars, safety line, resuscitator. Competition joke, here we go: Batman’s got a utility belt- there is an expression in the brigade now that Tynemouth eight, which is my utility belt, can actually go and do rescues by itself, there is much on it. This is a standing joke I keep going- you’ve got to have a bit of humour. There’s enough on the belt to keep me going everywhere.

I mean, I think I’m the only person, not only does, do I have a utility belt but in my kit bag where I keep the additional clothing, the gloves, the hat, the packet of mints, the nappy wipes. And people think, “why, why the Hell have you got nappy wipes?” Because in the middle of nowhere, you can’t wash your hands, and as brigadesmen will tell you, if we’ve been running ropes, people with dogs don’t tidy up, and you’ve got to wash your hands somewhere.

But the utility belt is a bit of a standing joke. It’s a competition. Obviously, if we’re going out, you strip the belt down and carry what you need to carry. So if I’m going out at night on a typical search, I would have on my belt, I’d have my penknife, my multi-tool, I’d have my LED torch, I’d have my Maglite, I’d have my GPS, and I’d have my resuscitator, and I’d have a little pouch which has inside my whistle and my notepad, because obviously we need to take notes and that. But you tailor the belt- obviously you can- I can’t get anymore on the belt now, I’m physically need a crane to carry the damn thing.

Dave has 11 memories in the memorynet:

This memory has these themes:
Clothing | Equipment | Volunteering

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