Blogs
Marine Archaeologist Mensun Bound: “Nothing Compares with Finding the Endurance...”
3rd November 2022 Wavelength Podcast
Marine archaeologist Mensun Bound has witnessed great works of art lying on the seabed and chests overflowing with treasure, but says, “nothing compares with finding the Endurance....” Speaking at the recent Shackleton Autumn School in Athy, Co Kildare, Bound described…
The “Spatial Squeeze” is a term you can expect to hear quite a lot about in the immediate future. It’s all to do with the increasing competition for space in the offshore sector. Wind energy developers require space for wind-generating…
Dublin Port Encourages Ringsend’s Sense Of Itself As A Historic Maritime Community
29th October 2022 W M Nixon
When the multi-talented John B Kearney (1879-1967) retired from a distinguished career in Dublin Port in 1944, he re-focused most of his attention on his parallel interest as a yacht designer and builder. It was an enduring passion that went…
MGM Boats: After 25 Years, Dun Laoghaire’s Top Marine Business Has Busy International Footprint
22nd October 2022 W M Nixon
For most sailors in what is Ireland’s largest and busiest pier-enclosed recreational harbour, MGM Boats of Dun Laoghaire are, first and foremost, the people who provide the essential service of one of Ireland’s largest and most versatile travel hoists. For…
Praise for Royal Cork Yacht Club Race Communications and Offshore Sailing on the South Coast in 2023
20th October 2022 Tom MacSweeney
The Royal Cork Yacht Club (RCYC) at Crosshaven has received a lot of praise for the running of Sunday’s Autumn League during a “weather window” in Cork Harbour, getting the fleet home before a gale hit the Cork area which…
Ringsend Sailing Trawlers: Cormac Lowth's New Book is Launched at Poolbeg Yacht and Boat Club
15th October 2022 Wavelength Podcast
“Broken hoops on the shore; at the land a maze of dark cunning nets; farther away chalk scrawled backdoors and on the higher beach a drying line with two crucified shirts. Ringsend: wigwams of brown steersman and master mariners. Human…
Ted Crosbie combined so many of the strongest threads of Cork life that he embodied an entire Munster universe of personal positivity. Family was everything to him, but so too was the unique and bustling maritime city of Cork and…
The Olympic authorities see the Laser as the floating equivalent of the pole-vaulter’s vaulting pole, thereby making Laser sailors into proper individual athletes, and very worthy of Olympic inclusion.But meanwhile, some in the upper echelons of Olympic decision-making see two-person…
Flares Up: A Story Bigger than the Atlantic - New Book Reveals Drama of Transatlantic Rowing Adventure
1st October 2022 Wavelength Podcast
English firefighter Paul Hopkins (55) had recovered from a brain haemorrhage and entrepreneur Phil Pugh (65) was renowned for undertaking extreme physical challenges in honour of his son when they rowed into Antigua in a fourth-hand wooden rowing boat in…
Afloat.ie’s September “Sailors of the Month” Listings Mark The Turn Of The Seasons
1st October 2022 W M Nixon
September is a month of harvests afloat as it is ashore, and as we reach October with its inescapable sense of the change in the seasons, our bountiful new monthly list of no less than six different and distinctive September…
The Kenmare River where Kerry verges into Cork is one of Ireland’s cruising gems – it’s pure gold and then some. But we weren’t exactly cruising when the Nixon Tribe descended on the area precisely a year ago for a…
Champions’ Cup at Sutton Will Continue 75-Year Golden Thread Of Helmsman’s Championship
17th September 2022 W M Nixon
The Helmsman’s Championship? Crazy name. Surely it should at least have been The Helmsmen’s Championship? Yet in its quirkiness, it achieved brand recognition to die for. Everyone knew what it meant, so much so it could even be shortened to…
Sea Swimmers Maybe Better Protected Against Harmful Organisms - Research
16th September 2022 Wavelength Podcast
Preliminary research into the impact of harmful organisms in bathing water suggests that regular sea swimmers leading a healthy life may have some protection. University of Galway expert Prof Dearbháile Morris cautions that the indications are preliminary, and require more…
Giving the Oceans Rights Through The Ocean Race - Marine Biologist Lucy Hunt
15th September 2022 Tom MacSweeney
There is no greater community to understand the changes in the oceans and what needs to be done to protect them than sailors. From those like myself, a leisure sailor, to fishermen, to marine scientists, to the professional seafarers, greater…
Where other Irish harbours face the sea, Kinsale embraces it. And this generous geographical reality helps to provide a genuine sense of community interaction when any initiative at the hospitable south Cork port is put together to help get young…
Danú of Galway Adventurers Record Scientific Achievements in Greenland's Fjord System
3rd September 2022 Wavelength Podcast
You don’t want to run out of Marmite, butter or Guinness on board a yacht in a remote part of Greenland. One piece of advice from a very elated Richard Darley, who sailed the 3,300 nautical mile trip by Danú…