The Thames's Christmas Lifeboat

Christmas morning and the city awoke. It is the season to be merry and many started that day with happy cries surrounded by loved ones.

But not all.

For at least one Londoner it was a cold, bleak midwinter day, with nothing to celebrate, a day where legs took them down to Wandsworth Bridge and that final leap.

However they were not forsaken. Even early on Christmas day, when others were having their morning coffee, one of the Thames lifeboats was on standby together with a police boat, hovering in the water below the jumper, ready to save their life.

And so it was all day long. The picture above was taken on the evening of Christmas Day, and there, still, the lifeboat was on out patrol.

The good shepherd of the Thames, watching out for Londoners, every day of the year.