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… at a meeting of the Tay Steam Packet Co., held yesterday, a number of Gentlemen formed themselves into a committee for procuring, by subscription, what has long been a desideration here - a life boat. The subscription was commenced and will, we trust, be speedily filled up. Two weeks later, on the strength of £80 by then raised and promises of more donations, a Greathead-style lifeboat was ordered from Robson of South Shields at a cost of £130. The shed and launching rails cost a further £206. Thirty feet long and crewed by twelve pulling oarsmen and two steering oarsmen, the first lifeboat was stationed next to the leading lights at Buddon Ness, as close as possible to the point of greatest danger, the shifting sandbanks that line the river’s mouth. The RNLI took over the management of the River Tay lifeboats in December 1861 and the first boatshed on the present site in Fisher Street, Broughty Ferry, was built the following year. The old Buddon Ness lifeboat station closed in December 1893. Broughty Ferry station was completely rebuilt in 1909 to house a motor lifeboat. Although much altered internally and externally, first to house larger all-weather boats, then to house the inshore lifeboat and then to provide greatly improved crew facilities, the 1909 boatshed is still in use today. A jetty, completed in 2001, was provided so that the station’s latest Trent class lifeboat Elizabeth of Glamis can lie alongside.
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