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Afloat – Ireland's Sailing and Boating Magazine
A busy season ahead for the SB20 sportsboats – Read the 2018 fixtures calendar below
2018 will be a stand out year for the Irish SB20 class with the and European Championships taking place in Dublin Bay at the end of August. Club racing will continue next summer in both Dublin Bay and on Lough…
The Harbour Innovation Campus will open at St Michael's Pier in July 2018
#DLHarbour - Reservations are now being taken for co-working spaces on Dun Laoghaire’s waterfront at what’s being touted as ‘Ireland’s largest innovation campus’. As many as 1,000 workers will benefit from the facilities at the Harbour Innovation Campus at St…
One of the two dogs rescued along with their owners from a small sailing yacht that had been adrift for months in the western Pacific
#Offshore - Two women have been rescued in the Pacific Ocean after a dream voyage from Hawaii to Tahiti turned into a months-long nightmare, as RTÉ News reports. Jennifer Appel and Tasha Fuiaba set out five months ago on their…
#WorldLargest - An historic milestone in Dublin Port took place late last night as Celine, the world’s largest short-sea ro-ro freight ferry completed a commercial maiden voyage from mainland continental Europe, writes Jehan Ashmore. On arrival from Zeebrugge, Belgium, a…
Irish Sailors and their impressive haul from the Hague Optimist Cup 2017 in Scheveningen in the Netherlands. Sailors from left to right Sam Ledoux, Johnny Flynn, Nathan van Steeberge, Leah Rickard, Clementine van Steenberge, and Rocco Wright
Last weekend, six Irish Optimist Sailors participated in the The Hague Optimist Cup 2017 in Scheveningen in the Netherlands. The event was the test event for the 2018 European Optimist Championships, Team Ireland, composed of Leah Rickard, Nathan van Steeberge,…
Irish Sailing Optimist Squad Investigation is Launched
An 'independent external' investigation into Saturday's Irish Sailing Optimist performance squad incident during Storm Brian at Dun Laoghaire is underway. According to a statement on the association website last night, Irish Sailing President Jack Roy and CEO Harry Hermon have appointed Philip…
Jenny Egan
#Canoeing: Ireland's Jenny Egan finished third in the canoe marathon World Cup race over 26.2 kilometres in Shanghai today. This was the final race of the International Canoe Federation series in Shaoxing and Shanghai. Egan took a silver and a…
Marine Notice: Offshore Survey Operations For ‘Celtic Interconnector’ Project
#MarineNotice - The survey vessel Kommandor Iona is conducting offshore survey operations associated with the proposed Celtic Interconnector, on behalf of EirGrid. As with last month’s nearshore survey, the current works are in two main corridors to three landfall points…
There are concerns in Holyhead Port that there will be an increase in direct routes from Ireland to the EU. Afloat adds that at the outer harbour (Salt Island) are ferries from rivals Irish Ferries and Stena Line docked at the double berth linkspan jetty.
#GiantFerries - The world’s largest ferry which is to arrive on a Dublin to continental Europe route writes The Daily Post has sparked post Brexit fears over trade at Holyhead port. The 234m ro-ro freight ferry Celine as reported on…
#Canoeing: Jenny Egan took bronze at the canoe marathon World Cup in Shanghai in China. Kristina Bedek of Serbia won the 3.6 kilometre K1 race, with Lizzie Broughton of Britain and Egan filling the next two slots in a close…
Rescue 116 pictured over Wicklow in August 2015
#Rescue116 - Lifejackets worn by the crew of the downed Rescue 116 were not fit for purpose — and the operators of Ireland’s coastguard rescue helicopter service knew five years beforehand. That’s according to a report set to be broadcast…
Vests 11th Hour Racing catch the sunrise after rounding Porto Santo
#VOR - Vestas 11th Hour Racing were the first team of the Volvo Ocean Race fleet to round Porto Santo in the early hours of this morning (Thursday 26 October), beginning the home stretch of Leg 1 to Lisbon. But…
The logistics of handling the large amounts of fibreglass hulls from abandoned or derelict vessels poses a significant challenge
The International Maritime Organisation, that’s the United Nations agency for safety at sea, has acknowledged, the first time this has been publicised, that a large number of abandoned or no-longer usable fibreglass vessels - including fishing vessels and leisure craft…
The Optimists ideal. Happy kids and their boats in profusion in Dun Laoghaire Harbour: “A little bit of somethin’ God-given……..like a bird’s wing, you know, and there’s nothin’ else like it”. But conditions aren’t always so perfect, and sometimes we have to make allowances when enthusiasm over-rides caution
W M Nixon on the aftermath of Saturday's Optimist dinghy training incident during Storm Brian. “A boat, by God, it’s just a gleamin’ beautiful creation. And when you pull the sail up on a boat, you’ve got a little bit…
The Xp-44 XP-ACT, with a strong Irish representation on board, finally gets to free sheets at Favignana after a hard sail off Sicily’s northwest coast
If you had to be in a 35-footer as the remaining fleet in the Rolex Middle Sea Race 2017 negotiated those foul gale-and-backwash conditions off the huge cliffs of northwest Sicily earlier this week, then the JPK10.80 would have been…
Nick Jones & Barry Hurley (right). Nick Jones 44.7 Lisa won last year's RORC Season's Points Championship, and unofficially has retained the title
The first Maltese boat home in the Middle Sea Race was Josef Schultheis and Timmy Camilleri’s Xp-ACT with Ireland's Cork Harbour Sailor Barry Hurley on board, completing the offshore race after just over three and a half days a sea…
The Valletta registered giant ro-ro Celine is towed astern (top photo /see rope) through a Dutch road-lift bridge having sailed on a delivery voyage from South Korea.  The naval architecture of the newbuild is much more akin to a large car-carrier compared to CLnD /Cobelfret's range of other ro-ro currently in service, albeit several ships of recent years.
#WorldLargest - As Afloat.ie reported on Monday, the World's largest ro-ro freight ferry is to make a maiden call to Dublin Port however the giant newbuild made a debut call to Rotterdam yesterday following a delivery voyage, writes Jehan Ashmore.…
The leaders – with Vestas 11th Hour Racing still the pathfinder, and Damian Foxall in a senior crew role - are dealing this morning with the here-and-now of light headwinds
The favourable east to southeast winds which carried the seven Volvo Ocean Race 2017-2018 contenders so positively through the Straits of Gibralter and into the Atlantic are already a fading memory writes W M Nixon. The leaders – with Vestas…
Minister Kyne with the Inland Fisheries Ireland team at the recent Ploughing Championships
#Angling - Three new angling bye-laws have been introduced in the Eastern River Basin District by Minister of State with responsibility for Inland Fisheries, Sean Kyne. Conservation of Coarse Fish and Pike Dundalk District (Lough Muckno) Bye-law No 950, 2017…
Pupils from Coláiste Croí Mhuire with Conall O'Malley, scientific and technical officer at the Marine Institute
#MarineScience - Transition Year pupils from Coláiste Croí Mhuire in Spiddal learned recently that a tracking drifter device they were using to measure the surface currents of Galway Bay before it was lost ended up off the coast of Scotland,…

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