VIKING Life-Saving Equipment

A rescue that showed the life-saving potential of our liferafts 🌊 In March 1963, the cutter Dagmar Larsen was struck by floating debris in the North Sea and began to sink. Its crew of three took to a VIKING liferaft, installed just one day before departure. After three and a half days adrift, all three were rescued. Their survival helped build local fishermen’s confidence in what a liferaft could do. Their story is one of the earliest documented examples of our liferafts saving lives at sea – and it continues to guide our work today 💙

Servicing a liferaft is a personal responsibility 🧑🏻🔧 Every VIKING liferaft is serviced regularly at one of our 280+ stations worldwide. Our technicians never treat it as routine. "When I service a liferaft, I always imagine that I am onboard the vessel," says Kent Bjerrum, a VIKING service technician. "This is the easiest way to understand how important the things you are working with really are." Get to know what a day of a liferaft service technician looks like 🔗

A ferry sinking in a violent storm became a defining moment in our liferaft history 🌊 In September 1966, the Danish ferry Skagerak sank in the North Sea. All 147 people aboard were rescued in an international operation involving lifeboats, ships, helicopters and our liferafts. The captain later praised the liferafts for their protection and ease of boarding - and for making it easier to rescue people by ship or helicopter in rough seas. That very rescue operation demonstrated the role liferafts could play in a large-scale passenger evacuation. It forms part of the decades of experience behind the safety equipment we design, test and deliver today. Read the full rescue story 🔗

A liferaft has to withstand more than rough seas 🌊 Our early testing photographs show colleagues jumping into liferafts again and again, from different heights. Behind the unusual sight was a serious question: how would the liferaft handle the impact of people landing inside during an evacuation? Over six decades, our testing methods have evolved. The attention to detail behind every liferaft leaving our production remains. Explore the tests behind your safety at sea in the full article 🔗

We changed the liferaft service routine with a simple swap 🔄️ Traditionally, servicing meant taking a liferaft off the vessel, servicing it and returning it. Liferaft exchange changed that routine: a certified replacement goes aboard while the other liferaft comes ashore. It is a simple idea that reflects how our work has developed over the decades. Alongside designing and building liferafts, we have found new ways to make their upkeep fit the operations they protect.

How often do you see a CEO in boots and a rain coat, joining colleagues at a liferaft test? At Esbjerg’s fishing harbour in the 1960s, our first CEO Jens Bjerre-Madsen was actively involved in the work. We started building liferafts to help local fishermen survive emergencies at sea and return safely to their families. Making sure people can depend on our products was a shared responsibility then - and it remains one for all of us today 💙 📖 Read the story behind the liferafts you know 🔗