St Helen's Fort Walk: Walkers ignore warnings to make crossing

Drone images showed hundreds of people walking along the causeway on Saturday evening

Lifeboat crews were called to rescue people taking part in an unofficial mass walk to an offshore fort.

Hundreds of people ignored official advice and walked to St Helen's Fort off the Isle of Wight during the weekend's low tides.

The RNLI said it was called to help a mother and child as well as a missing child. All were safely located.

The coastguard had previously warned against taking "unnecessary risks" by walking to the fort.

The 19th Century Solent fort, which is normally surrounded by sea, becomes accessible via a causeway during the lowest tides of the year.

The mass walk is not officially organised but has become a local tradition and is widely discussed on social media.

Drone footage filmed by Island Echo on Saturday, showed hundreds making the crossing, despite the warnings.

Bembridge RNLI said while Saturday's walk had been "relatively quiet and uneventful", it launched its inshore lifeboat at 18:30 BST on Sunday to assist a mother and her child who had got into difficulty in the water.

The walk to the fort involves wading through the seawater

Its all-weather lifeboat was also later launched to search for a missing 12-year-old girl who had also been walking to the fort.

The RNLI said it monitored the last remaining walkers on Sunday evening, some of whom were up to their shoulders in the water.

Last year, a group of eight people had to be rescued, while four adults and two children were picked up after being spotted on the causeway as darkness fell.

The privately-owned fort is the smallest of the so-called Palmerston's Follies - a group of sea forts built in the 19th Century to deter a French invasion.

The mass walk to St Helen's Fort has become a local tradition during the lowest tides of the year