ANTIQUES Roadshow honoured RNLI Swanage exploring its history and a historic model ship donated by V&A curator. 

Antiques Roadshow visited Swanage RNLI in its most recent episode of the show aired on BBC One on March 24. 

Speaking to coxswain, Dave Turnbull, Fiona Bruce was educated on the historic lifeboat station and a specific model donated in 1875 by V&A curator, John Charles Robinson. 

Dave said: "The model was commissioned by the RNLI and was given to the family of the donor who gave money for the first lifeboat here as a thank you.

"It's been handled down through various families over the years and we were contacted by somebody in the family to say, look we've got this model, we think it would be better down with you. 

"We don't have any photos of that boat, to actually see a model is amazing."

Filmed in June 2023, Julia spoke to Dave on the importance of the RNLI and also the invention of the lifejacket. 

While sharing how the lifejacket made of cork saved lives nationwide, Dave spoke about how he was honoured to represent his lifeboat station to a national audience. 

He said: "It's a nice thing to be able to do, it's nice to let other people see that model and some of the history we've got here and talk a little bit about it. 

"I didn't watch it live, one of out kids is poorly so we got everybody to bed and then the messages started coming in about it at about 8.20pm with people saying it was really good. I watched it a bit later on."

Dave described Fiona Bruce as 'lovely' and said he enjoyed watching how the show is made.  

Using typical camera trickery, Dave gave insight knowledge that, although she wore the same clothes, the segment at the RNLI was filmed on a different day to the rest of the show. 

He said: "It was filmed over a number of days but we did it on a Saturday so it was a fairly early start but she was lovely."