STV NewsA mum rescued after being dragged two miles out to sea while clinging onto a paddleboard has reunited with the RNLI volunteer “heroes” who saved her life.
Mandy Galloway, 45, had been paddleboarding with her partner off Kingsbarns in Fife in July 2023 when the wind suddenly picked up and the pair found themselves being swept out to sea.
Her partner began paddling back towards shore to raise the alarm, but Mandy said she could feel herself being pulled further out.
“He was getting closer to the shore and I felt like I was getting further away from him,” she said. “That’s when I really started to panic.
“I’d got myself in such a state screaming to him not to leave me.”
Eventually, she decided to stop paddling and focus on staying on the board – but was then hit by a wave that knocked her into the sea and flipped the board upside down.
STV NewsThis left her in the water wearing only a swimming costume, a T‑shirt and a pair of Crocs, holding onto her board’s fin for dear life amid worsening sea conditions.
“I started to get colder and colder. I’d been on my knees on the paddleboard, holding on, but I lost feeling in my legs. They went numb,” she said.
“But my upper body was starting to get cold as well, so the hand that was holding onto the fin – that was really starting to lose grip.
“I lost hope probably in the last few minutes before they got to me. I thought I was going to die.
“At that point I thought, ‘please let me pass out before I fall in. I didn’t want to drown.'”
Once the alarm was raised, two RNLI lifeboats were launched from Anstruther lifeboat station and raced to the area where she was last seen.
However, the search was made difficult by choppy conditions, the white underside of Mandy’s paddleboard and the fact she was dressed in blue.
Mandy said the first thing she heard when the lifeboat arrived was: “I’m so glad we found you.”
“I said, ‘I’m more glad to see you,’” she added.
STV NewsScott Brown, who was one of three crew on board the smaller inshore lifeboat, said: “At the end of the search was still no casualty. So that’s when we then went to local knowledge.
“We knew which way the tide was going, the wind, and we extended the search.
“At that point, we’re really concerned – all three of us were worried that, basically we’re looking for needle in a haystack.
Fellow crew member Louis McNaught spotted the paddleboard after it crested a wave.
“She was hanging on to the paddleboard when we spotted her,” he said. “The conditions were really difficult – blue and white waves, and we were searching for a blue and white paddleboard.”
Scott said the crew’s relief at finding her turned to “almost panic” when they saw the state she was in after about 90 minutes in the water.
“She was really bad. We needed to get her out that water quick,” Scott said.
“She was extremely hypothermic, really weak, and she just looked like someone who didn’t have long left. She just didn’t look in a good way at all.”
After being pulled from the water, Mandy received treatment from the crew – including from a doctor on board the larger all-weather lifeboat – and was taken to hospital on reaching shore.
She was released a few hours later.
Mandy said when she knew she was safe she just wanted to go home to see the children she thought she would never see again.
“I just felt so grateful, so grateful. My kids are my world, so that just meant everything to me,” she said.
“And since then, I’ve got three grandkids that I would never have got to see, and I’ve waited for that for so long, to have grandkids, so that I’m grateful for as well.
“They’ve got me now because of the lifeboat crew.”
STV NewsShe said the experience had changed her outlook on life.
“You never know how long you’ve got,” she added.
More than two years later, Mandy returned to Anstruther lifeboat station to meet some of the RNLI volunteers who rescued her, and thank them personally for saving her life.
“It’s amazing to see them,” she said. “They are heroes.
“They’re heroes in a lot of people’s eyes, and they’re definitely in mine and my family.
“Without them, I wouldn’t be here.
“So everybody’s grateful for what they do, and for the voluntary job that they do.
“I can’t ask enough for people to donate. It’s an amazing job that they do.”
New figures show RNLI lifeboats launched 9,058 times in the UK in 2025 and saved 272 lives – including 1,172 launches in Scotland.
Mandy shared her story ahead of the RNLI’s Mayday appeal, which including the Mayday Mile challenge, where people complete a mile a day in May to help raise funds to support the RNLI’s lifesaving work.
To find out more about the campaign visit fundraise.rnli.org/event/mayday-mile/home
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