Hélène Quévreux, our new biologist for the 2023 season tells us about the latest scientific survey onboard Celtic Mist
After a few busy weeks between floating classrooms, Cork Harbour Festival and the Fair Seas conference during the World Ocean Day, Celtic Mist is back out at sea.
Like the previous week of surveys, forecast of this week was perfect for sightings: not too much wind with only small waves and good visibility most of the time. That’s why we decide to take advantage of this good weather to survey far from land. We were able to collect data and cover a large potential protected area with a total of 175 nautical miles (325 km) on visual effort during more than 32 hours (searching for animals). Thanks to our updated protocols from last year, we collected environmental data along with marine mammals but also marine litter and creels for potential future studies about marine mammals’ threats.
This week however was quieter than earlier in May, with 38 sightings total. During this week we spotted harbour porpoises, greys seals, active common dolphins (jumping, fast swimming and bowriding) and variety of marine birds. Almost every day, we experienced different kind of weather during the day: clouds, sun, even few hours of mist making difficult to spot animals. Unluckily, on the first day almost everyone on board got seasick because of swell from previous windy days. We really experienced what sailing life is all about!
Unfortunately, Celtic Mist had a mechanical issue at the end of our fourth day of surveying. While we were maneuvering in Castlehaven Bay, the steering stopped responding because of a leak coming from the hydraulic system and we had to anchor as quickly as we could. Thanks to our skipper, Liam, we did it safely close enough from shore to be protected from the wind. Just for precaution, the decision was made to conduct an overnight anchor watch during the night. The whole crew took a 2 hours watch turn from 10 p.m to 8 a.m. The next morning, our amazing skipper managed to reach Baltimore with an emergency procedure in order to get the Celtic Mist fixed.
As it was a quieter week sightings wise, everyone on board had time to enjoy the Celtic Mist in different ways. Some of us cooked tasty meals, others baked “boat made” brown bread. A special shout out to Wild Fushia Bakehouse for their donation! We played Qwirkle (a funny board game) and others cards games and learnt and practiced different knots. We also spent time reading books about Irish’ legends, swimming and telling each other’s (funny bad) jokes like it was a comedy contest. While anchored we even tried to catch some fish for dinner, sadly without success. We enjoyed time on land in pubs and eating ice cream in Kinsale and Baltimore. One thing to remember from this week, we never get bored on the Celtic Mist!
Thanks to his amazing crew – Eamonn, Emily, Hélène, Irene, Lara, Liam, Pádraic & Peter – for sailing with us and help us collect data this week! We really appreciated your commitment to IWDG and the whales and dolphins in our waters.
This year’s surveys are being run in collaboration with Fair Seas. During the season Celtic Mist will be surveying the waters of the Southwest Coast and Loop Head to Kenmare Areas of Interest (AoI) collecting vital information on the marine life in our waters.