Sue Body (front) meets the Queen during her tour of the Tower Bridge Lifeboat Station Picture: Lewis Whyld/PA Wire

A LIFEBOAT crew member met the Queen last month when she made an unexpected visit to RNLI Tower Bridge Lifeboat Station.

Sue Body (25), of Trinity, volunteers for the station during term time while studying medicine at University College London, and she spoke to the Queen as she was given a tour around the station.

‘I was on duty anyway for that day,’ said the former Jersey College for Girls pupil. ‘It happened by chance that I was there.

‘The Queen requested to come down to the lifeboat station and she was there for about 45 minutes and had a good look around.

‘She was introduced to us, the duty crew, and to other crew members at other stations on the Thames. She seemed to really enjoy it. We were the first to be introduced to her and she wanted to know about the boat and where we cover on the river and what exactly we do.’

Jersey-born Sue trained as a lifeboat crew member when she was a 17-year-old student at Atlantic College in south Wales.

She was on board the St Helier inshore lifeboat when it was called out to rescue two men whose boat had crashed onto the rocks at Le Fret Point, between Portelet and Ouaisné.