 T. E. Lawrence, better known as Lawrence of Arabia, joined the RAF in 1929, working at the flying boat station, Mount Batten in Plymouth Sound.He witnessed first-hand the deficiencies in the rescue system when a seaplane tender, despatched to save the survivors of an airplane crash in the Solent, arrived too late to save them before they drowned.He immediately began to press his commanding officer for the introduction of fast motorboat launches as rescue boats.