The latest Marine Notice from the Department of Transport brings the attention of fishing boat owners, skippers and crew to the safety provisions of the Code of Practice for fishing vessels less than 15m length overall.

It follows the publication last month of the Marine Casualty Investigation Board’s (MCIB) report into an incident on the FV Kayleigh off Sheep’s Head in West Cork in March last year.

The vessel sank after a fire broke out in its engine compartment on the night of 3 March 2020.

Two crew with burn injuries caused by a fireball were recovered from a life raft at the scene and the vessel was abandoned, presumed to have sunk the following day.

In its analysis of the incident, the MCIB found that the crew’s injuries “may have been avoided if [they] had remembered to carry out the procedures for entering a compartment known to contain a fire”.

Marine Notice No 04 of 2021 outlines pertinent information for fishing vessel owners, skippers and crew including firefighting training requirements, and guidelines for fire detection and alarm systems on board.

The full notice is available to download below.

The first and second legs of the annual Irish Anglerfish and Megrim Survey (IAMS 2021) will be carried out from Monday 8 February to Thursday 4 March.

As with previous years, IAMS 2021 is a demersal trawl survey consisting of approximately 110 otter trawls (60 minutes) in ICES areas 7b, 7c, 7g, 7h, 7j and 7k off the West, South West and South Coasts of Ireland by the Marine Institute in fulfilment of Ireland’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) obligations.

The survey will be conducted by the RV Celtic Explorer (Callsign: EIGB) which will be towing a Jackson demersal trawl during fishing operations and will display appropriate lights and signals.

Commercial fishing and other marine operators are requested to keep a three-nautical-mile radius area around the tow points (indicated below) clear of any gear or apparatus during the survey period outlined above.

Further details of the survey, including co-ordinates of the survey stations, are included in Marine Notice No 03 of 2021, a PDF of which is available to download below.

The latest Marine Notice from the Department of Transport draws attention to the Merchant Shipping (Passenger Ship) Rules 2020 which were made law by Statutory Instrument on 15 December.

This new legislation provides a national regulatory regime for passenger ships of less than 24 metres in length and constructed of steel or aluminium on or after 1 July 1998 and engaged on domestic voyages.

Exempted from these rules are high-speed passenger craft, to which the European Union (Passenger Ships) Regulations 2019 (SI No 676 of 2019) apply.

The rules maintain an appropriate safety regime for such passenger ships following changes that took effect in 2019 in associated European Union legislation. They include safety standards and requirements in relation to ship construction, fire protection, life-saving appliances and radio communications.

A full briefing on the new rules is included in Marine Notice No 02 of 2021, a PDF of which is available to download below.

The Department of Transport has re-established a panel of surveyors to conduct surveys of small fishing vessels of less than 15m for compliance with the relevant Code of Practice, which was recently under review.

The panel was established three weeks ago on Wednesday 23 December and will continue until 22 December 2023. Contact details for all six panelists are included in Marine Notice No 01 of 2021, a PDF of which is available to download below.

The Irish Coast Guard has has upgraded radio equipment at a number of VHF network remote locatosn in recent months.

Following these upgrades, the table below sets out the detail of the new coastguard working channels that are now in operation:

The remaining sites of Carlingford (CH04), Wicklow (CH02), Mizen Head (CH04), Galway (CH04), Clew Bay (CH05), Donegal Bay (CH02), Lough Ree (CH62) and Lough Derg (CH61) will retain their respective currently assigned channel.

A map showing the radio sites including the new channels and a guide to transmissing VHF distress alerts are included in Marine Notice No 61 of 2020, which is available to download below

Ultra Deep Solutions will be carrying out subsea exploration activities off the North West Coast from tomorrow, Wednesday 16 December.

The work will be conducted a number of weeks, progress and weather depending, within the vicinity of 55° 19’N, 009° 41’W.

Vessel-mounted equipment, ROV and saturation divers will be operating from the MV Lichtenstein (Callsign C6DC6), which requests a wide berth from all other vessel due to its restricted ability to manoeuvre.

Further details are included in Marine Notice No 60 of 2020, which is available to download below.

The latest Marine Notice from the Department of Transport draws attention to the Code of Practice for the Safe Operation of Recreational Craft, following two recent reports from the Marine Casualty Investigation Board (MCIB).

In October, the MCIB’s report into the death of a long West Cork fisherman 12 months previously suggested that he may have fallen overboard from this open-deck vessel.

As previously reported on Afloat.ie, the MCIB determined that 23-year-old Kodie Healy was not wearing a lifejacket or personal flotation device (PFD) prior to the indecent in Dunmanus Bay on 9 October 2019 — and he may not have been aware of a personal locator beacon on his vessel.

September’s report into an incident on Lough Mask in March 2019 also found that the individual involved was not wearing a lifejacket.

The MCIB was unable to establish the cause of the incident on 8 March in which the 78-year-old experienced angler drowned. But the fact his boat was found upright suggests he had fallen overboard and was unable to get back into his boat.

Marine Notice No 58 of 2020 (available to download below) highlights to all operators of recreational craft the important of abiding by legal requirements to wear a PFD while on board an open craft (or on the deck of decked craft) under seven meres in length.

As well as reminding boaters to ensure they check current weather forecasts and sea/lake/river conditions prior to departure, the notice also underscores the increased risks involved in single-handed boating.

Boaters should carry out a risk assessment to minimise the inherent risks involved when setting out single-handed without any colleagues to help or raise the alarm when in difficulty.

The Code of Practice is a free download from the Department of Transport website. Hard copies are also available on request, in both English and Irish, from the Marine Safety Policy Division at [email protected]

TechWorks Marine has scheduled the deployment of a wave buoy off the coast of Wicklow on Tuesday 8 December, weather allowing.

The buoy will be a yellow DB 500 and have a flashing light sequence of five flashes every 20 seconds, with a range of three nautical miles. The buoy will be marked with a St Andrew’s sross and radar reflector.

The wave buoy will be deployed at 53° 2' 35” N, -5° 41' 17” W by the the AMS Retriever (Callsign MEHI8) with an AIS system on board which has a provisional callsign of CWPW01.

If the deployment is delayed due to the weather, it will be carried out on the next viable tide and weather window. Once deployed, the wave buoy will remain on site for a minimum of six months.

Further details can be found in Marine Notice No 57 of 2020, a PDF of which is available to download below.

Seabed survey operations in the Kinsale, Greensands, Ballycotton and Seven Heads gas fields off West Cork are set to commence from tomorrow, Sunday 6 December.

PSE Kinsale Energy will undertake the decommissioning works on and around the relevant subsea infrastructure over the next week, weather permitting, from the RV Celtic Voyager (Callsign EIQN).

The surveys will extend over an area of 2.5km radius (including the area required by the vessel to turn) from each well head, towing a submerged cable of up to 500m behind the vessel.

Full coordinates for these survey operations and a map of the area are included in Marine Notice No 56 of 2020, a PDF of which can be downloaded below.

Mariners in Brandon Bay in Co Kerry are advised of the Marine Institute’s deployment of a Waverider buoy over the coming days, subject to weather conditions.

The Waverider is a yellow spherical buoy, 1m in diameter ad equipped with an antenna and light at a height of approximately 2m. The light will flash yellow for five seconds every 20 seconds in hours of darkness.

The buoy is being deployed for 12 months in the centre of Brandon Bay (52 16.94 N, 010 05.69 W) by the Ocean Supporter (Callsign EITS6), which will display appropriate signals and lights.

More details can be found in Marine Notice No 55 of 2020, a PDF of which is available to download below.