Over 320,000 people worldwide drown every year. As long as people and vessels are on the water, search and rescue (SAR) operations are needed. Yet operating conditions are increasingly challenging and SAR teams face unprecedented new risks.

Searchlight is the third short film commissioned by Lloyd’s Register Foundation to explore the relationship between the ocean and people all around the world – people who rely on the ocean for food or their livelihood, live in coastal communities, or those who work at sea. Given the increasing demands we are placing on ocean space and the risk of working in ever more extreme environments, how can we better protect people from harm?

The première is followed by a discussion between Ruth Boumphrey, Director of Research and Strategic Programmes for Lloyd’s Register Foundation, Dan McDougall, film director, writer and British Foreign Correspondent of the Year – who has won four Amnesty International Awards for Human Rights Reporting – and Jamie Chestnutt, Director of Engineering & Supply at the RNLI. In conversation with Andy Fryers, Sustainability Director at Hay Festival.