RNLI Swanage boathouse appeal doubles target

The station's 140-year-old boathouse has been demolished to make way for the new boathouse

A Dorset lifeboat station has had an overwhelming response to an appeal to raise money for its new boathouse.

The RNLI station at Swanage started a two-year appeal in 2013 to raise £200,000 towards the building needed to house a new larger lifeboat.

The station said more than double the amount had been raised in response.

Swanage RNLI operation manager Neil Hardy said: "We've had the generosity of the local community and various benefactors; it's just great."

The boathouse is expected to be completed by the summer

The money from the appeal will avoid the station having to use central funding from the charity for the build.

The £3.5m lifeboat station, which is being rebuilt on the site of the original boathouse in Peveril Point Road, is due for completion in the summer.

In April the crew will get a Shannon class lifeboat costing £1.5m to replace its current Mersey class lifeboat Robert Charles Brown.

The lifeboat is being kept on a mooring point while the new station is being built.