His family said:
We are feeling incredibly sad to have lost our beautiful Donny. An absolute gentleman with a twist of cheeky, our world’s have been turned upside down.May he rest in peace.His loving wife Diane, and daughters Lisa & NessieMay 13, 2025
The community extends deepest sympathy to the family and friends of Avalon Beach SLSC Life Member, Don Mitchell, and thanks his brother, sister, wife and daughter for sharing him with a grateful community.
Known as 'dad' to daughters Lisa and Vanessa, and a loving husband to wife Diane, or the man who would drop the surf club's younger members off on door-knock fundraising drives and let them undertake a long walk back to the clubhouse, on Sunday November 2nd 1969 Don joined his brother, fellow Avalon Beach SLSC Life Member Warren Mitchell OAM, as Bowman in the first test run of an IRB in Australian waters, at Avalon Beach.
For Warren Mitchell, the legacy of the little red boat lives on.
"Every time somebody puts their hand out in an IRB to rescue someone, it feels like my hand and the hands of all the other crews. It's our hands saving lives." he said when the 50th anniversary of this test was celebrated
Don Mitchell, brother of Warren Mitchell, who travelled from Tasmania to attend the 90th Anniversary Celebrations of Avalon Beach SLSC in 2015, related a little about the launch of the rubber duckie off Avalon Beach:
“I was the bowman.... My daughter, who was born on the 9th, had just come out of hospital. Warren had this rubber duckie, a Dunlop boat, and an old Evinrude motor, and we launched it here. We’d used it over in England, on the Cornish beaches, and brought it back here.”
The Mitchell boys grew up here and joined Avalon Beach SLSC before they'd reached their 13th year. Don was known as a great swimmer years before the advent of the IRB - past newspaper reports tells us:
VOLUNTEERS HELP
RESCUE 12 FROM SURF
Twelve surfers yesterday helped lifesavers to make a difficult mass rescue at Avalon beach.
Lifesavers appealed for help because they did not have enough men to man beltlines.
A strong rip had carried out 12 children and teenage girls and youths. It scattered them over a wide area within a few minutes. Because yesterday was a normal weekday, few life-savers .were on duty. Seven lifesavers were on the beach when the rip carried out the 12 young people. Three boys, three teenage girls, and six teenage boys were the 12 carried out.
Carried out
The children and teenagers were only 20 yards from the beach when the rip caught them. It scattered them over a wide area from 200 to 400 yards out. When lifesavers saw the swimmers in difficulty they appealed to the crowd for help. Twelve men volunteered to man beltlines. Lifesavers Paul Sheehan, Roy Hartman, and Maurie Unicomb donned belts and dived in. Lifesavers Don Mitchell and Michael Byrnes dived in without belts. Don Unicomb and Harry Ragan instructed the volunteers how to work beltlines. All lifesavers made at least two trips out to complete the mass rescue.
Rough seas and the wide area over which the victims were scattered made the rescue difficult. The rescue operation took about 10 minutes. None of the swimmers who were in difficulties panicked. Most were exhausted when lifesavers got them to the beach. One of the girls was suffering from severe shock. Some of the boys and one of the girls had swallowed water. They all recovered quickly. The youngest boy was nine years of age. Earlier yesterday a rip swept six boys out at Avalon. Don Unicomb and Harry Ragan brought them in with belts. VOLUNTEERS HELP RESCUE 12 FROM SURF (1954, December 31). The Daily Telegraph (Sydney, NSW : 1931 - 1954), p. 3. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article248937981
Mass Rescues At Two Sydney Beaches
In mass rescues at Avalon and Freshwater beaches yesterday, lifesavers rescued 37 surfers caught in dangerous currents.
At Avalon a rip at the southern end of the beach swept 12 persons 200 yards out to sea. Earlier lifesavers had rescued six swimmers.
At Freshwater, lifesavers rescued 19 surfers in two hours.
The Avalon surfers were brought back to shore in relays by five lifesavers after a 20 minutes struggle.
There is no patrol at Avalon during the week, but lifesavers Paul Sheehan, Roy Hartman, Morrie Unicombe, Don Mitchell and Michael Byrnes, who are on holidays, were at the beach at 4 p.m. when the rip carried the surfers out.
They brought two girls to a sand bank at the centre of the beach, then rescued another girl and a schoolboy who had been tossed from a rubber float by a wave.
Mitchell and Byrnes gathered the rest-two men and five boys-into a group and waited with them while life savers with lifelines brought the others in.
They drifted 300 yards from the beach before Sheehan, Hartman and Uni combe reached them with the lines.
While the linesmen towed the men and boys into the beach, the two girls first rescued were swept off the bank and again carried out to sea. Lifesavers reached them 50 yards out.
Two hours earlier, lifesavers Harry Ragan and Don Unicombe rescued six other surfers who were washed 200 yards out. With volunteer surfers handling the reel, Ragan donned the belt and with Unicombe brought them in.
RIP AT FRESHWATER
At Freshwater, beach inspector Jim Donald, with life savers Graham Carlisle and Kevin O'Keefe, rescued 19 surfers in two hours. Carlisle and O'Keefe were not on duty.
Donald said part of the beach became dangerous in the afternoon when the tide started to run out. A rip developed in a channel between the beach and a sandbank 20 yards out, and surfers crossing the channel outside the flagged safe area of beach were caught.
Donald said that shortly after 2 p.m. a woman, separated from her husband in the heavy surf, was caught in the rip and carried out.
SIX AT ONCE
He brought her in, and 10 minutes later rescued a middle-aged man who had been struggling to reach the bank.
Donald said: "From then on I didn't stop all afternoon. No sooner would I have some-one on to the beach, than there would be somebody else in trouble.
"They kept drifting out of the flagged area, and then the rip would catch them.
"Graham and Kevin gave me a hand, and I certainly needed it. Mass Rescues At Two Sydney Beaches (1954, December 31). The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), p. 5. Retrieved from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article18457912
Geoff Searl OAM, Life Member of Avalon Beach SLSC, said this week:
''Don's brother Warren went to Avalon Public School and their sister Judith (Judy) and I were in the same class for several years.''
Geoff is putting together an exhibition to run later this year on the History of Avalon Beach SLSC's 100 years of serving our community, 1925 to 2025, and shared the following on Don:
Don (or ‘Mulga’ as he was often called) was awarded his Bronze Medallion during the 1953/54 season.
He wasted no time in settling in and won the junior component of the Mignon War Memorial Shield the following year.
He won the Pillow-fight event at the Metropolitan Championship during the 1955/56 season and was Patrol Captain during the 1958/59 season.
Don was a keen carnival competitor and besides the pillow-fight, was successful in the Musical Flags at State level.
Through the timber trade, Don was able to secure timber for the clubhouse and the early boatshed extension to the north of the old clubhouse.
His dad Bill was a very generous financial supporter of the Club.
On 30 January 1961 John Campbell, John Fuller, Bob Head and Warren Mitchell headed to Cornwall in the UK to assist and instruct locals in surf life saving.
A beaut photo at Watergate Bay, dated 1963, exists of a group of these surf club members and it includes Don Mitchell.
On 2 November 1969 he joined his brother Warren as Bowman in the first test run of an IRB in Australian waters, at Avalon Beach.
Unfortunately for Don there was a reasonable surf running that day and as they hit bottom after coming down a rather steep section, the aluminium keelson buckled and Don ‘headbutted’ the metal fuel tank.
5 stitches later on the chin and it was back to the drawing board and the creation of a plasticised fuel tank for future runs.
Don Mitchell at IRB plaque unveiling - photo by Michael Mannington OAM for PON
Don received his Life Membership of the Club in 1986.
Don passed away on Tuesday 13 May this year aged 87 years.
I remember Don Mitchell being a good friend of my father Don and the many fun events at the surf club in the 1970's with those infamous chicken & champagne nights. - Jeff Imison
At the celebration of 50 years of IRBs at Avalon Beach on 2 November 2019, Warren’s brother Don attended and was proud to witness the unveiling of a plaque, commemorating the early days and the perseverance of his brother Warren in introducing the trusty craft to service all those years ago.
“Warren was very influential in getting IRBs into Surf Life Saving,” he said. “He was renowned for what he did, and I can only thank him as a brother.”
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Above: Warren Mitchell, our good mate, came to the Club on Sunday May 3rd, 2015. He said the IRB is now used for surf rescues in 40 countries around the world and that the relevant authorities in places as diverse as the US, Germany, South Africa, NZ, Surf Lifesaving Association of Britain, and China acknowledge that development of the IRB for surf rescues originated at Avalon Beach SLSC, Australia.
He very kindly presented a gift to myself (Roger Sayers) and one for Warren Young - miniature propellers - which I greatly appreciate.
Surf Life Saving NSW states:
Surf Lifesavers celebrated a milestone anniversary of the Inflatable Rescue Boat (IRB) on 2 November 2019, 50 years to the day that the first prototype was trialled at Avalon Beach in Sydney in front of a sceptical crowd of onlookers.Avalon Beach is considered by many as the birthplace of this ocean workhorse. This simple, hardy craft revolutionised surf rescue forever, still saving thousands of lives each year and significantly improving safety for frontline lifesaving volunteers.
Warren Mitchell was the young lifesaver from Avalon Beach who ventured overseas with a bunch of mates who all got jobs as lifeguards in the UK.
After a terrible drowning at Cornwall in the UK where he was on duty, Warren began thinking about how an inflatable boat could work to negotiate the break to reach patients more quickly than the line and reel method, which was possibly responsible for the deaths of more people than were saved.
On his return to Australia, Warren began trialling early versions of the IRB, conducting a test on 2 November 1969 using his brother Don as crash test dummy crewman. Going through the first wave, Don came down hard on the metal fuel tank and ended up with six stitches in his chin.
But traditionalists within the lifesaving movement resisted the change.
"Every time people said to me it wouldn't work, that was the worst thing they could have ever said to me,” said Warren Mitchell.
In December 1969, Warren was on patrol at Avalon Beach when eight people were dragged out to sea in a rip. He used the inflatable boat he was testing to rescue all eight people, making history as the first rescue conducted using an IRB.
Different versions of the boat went on to be tested including Mitchell’s Dunlop inflatable boat and Ken Brown’s French-made Zodiac.
Other surf clubs were experimenting with inflatable craft at the same time and the first IRB was officially approved for use by Australian surf clubs in 1970. Ken Brown went on to win an Australian Design Award in 1987 for the development of the rigid hull version of the boat.
Surf Life Saving NSW Powercraft Advisor Henry Scruton has been involved in IRB operations for many years and can’t help but marvel at its longevity and continued contribution.
“The little red boat hasn’t changed that much at all. The IRB has remained pretty much the same - same outboards, same pontoon configuration, it’s just a success. It’s saved many, many lives and created great opportunities for a lot of our youth to be involved in competition, enhancing their skills and making them better operators. And they’ve passed that onto other members and it’s had a big impact on surf life saving,” said Henry Scruton.
The unveiling of the plaque was a proud moment for many in the crowd and followed a demonstration of the manoeuvrability and prowess of the IRB, staged by crews from Avalon Beach and nearby clubs Queenscliff and Mona Vale.
