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A Sigma 33 One Design keelboat racing on Dublin Bay Photo: AfloatA Sigma 33 One Design keelboat racing on Dublin Bay Photo: Afloat

Displaying items by tag: Seminar

A seminar on “Seafarer Wellness” is to held at the National Maritime College of Ireland (NMCI), Ringaskiddy, Cork Harbour with the event taking place on Friday, 7 October.

The organisers of the event, The Nautical Institute (Ireland Branch), the Irish Institute of Master Mariners in association with the Dept. of Maritime Studies – NMCI invite you to join a Seminar on “Seafarer Wellness” which takes place from 0900 – 1700.

To register, please make your interest known with the Nautical Institute (Ireland Branch) by emailing: [email protected]

The seminar is open for anyone to attend but if you would like to be an official delegate with included catering, there will be a small charge of €20.

The Irish Institute of Master Mariners (IIMM) is a professional body of Ship Masters promoting safe, efficient and professional conduct in maritime operations in Ireland and internationally.

For any further updates visit IIMM and social media accounts.

Published in Ports & Shipping

The Marine Institute in Oranmore, Co Galway will host an Irish Crayfish Seminar on Tuesday 21 and Wednesday 22 May in response to recent outbreaks of crayfish plague in Ireland’s waterways.

A series of talks by invited speakers from across Ireland and Europe will cover many aspects of crayfish ecology and what is known about the disease.

The latest international and national research findings will be presented on the broad topics of:

  • Irish crayfish in national, all Ireland and European contexts.
  • Ecology of white-clawed crayfish in Ireland.
  • Crayfish plague: What is it? How did it get here? What can we do about it?
  • Crayfish plague in Europe: What can we learn from the European experience?
  • Biosecurity: its importance and practical advice on safe, clean working.

The event is free but booking is essential. Resigter online before 5pm on Monday 13 May.

An outline of the two-day seminar with confirmed speakers is available to read or download HERE.

Published in Marine Wildlife

#DublinPort - A seminar to mark the centenary of the end of WW1 is to be held in the Dublin Port Company's Port Centre building on Alexandra Road, tomorrow, Saturday, 3 November.

The event held in advance of the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day, is to involve talks from distinguished historians who will tell the story of Dublin Port and City from 1914-18.

TAKE NOTE: At this stage, please be advised the ticketed event is fully booked out!

For those of you who missed out this time, Dublin Port Company draws your attention to keep an eye on their Facebook page (click here) for more planned great historical seminars. 

Background to Seminar on World War 1

From 1914 to 1923 the Irish people endured ten years of intense military activity, including participation in a World War, an urban insurrection, a Guerrilla War and finally a bitter Civil War.

The Result was a new nation bearing both the hopes of many of its citizens, and the pain left by the wars that had brought it into being. When Europe went to war in 1914, Ireland (as part of the British Empire) was automatically involved.

Over the course of the war, about 150,000 Irishmen volunteered to fight in the British Army and 30,000 were killed. The motives of the individual soldiers for enlisting varied and 59 members of the Dublin Port & Docks Board served in the Royal Navy and British Army, 4 of whom died.

At the same time the Dublin Dockyard Company opened a shell factory employing local women.

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Published in Dublin Port

The first of the new ISA Junior Sailing Performance Seminars was postponed last month and will now take place at a date to be announced in 2017.  As Afloat.ie reported in September the ISA announced that the seminars were replacing the ISA Optimist Squads and ISA Topper Squad which have traditionally run from October to March.

The ISA said at the launch of the new initiative: 'Given our limited resources we feel this approach will give a better return on investment while at the same time giving the pathway much more visibility across a wider base'.  

Scheduled for the Irish Institute of Sport last weekend the first of three winter seminars was aimed at 'junior sailors of all classes born between 2001 and 2004 who are passionate about their sailing and want to learn important skills which will help with their overall development in the sport'.

No reason has been given as to why the October date was postponed by the ISA on its website here.

The seminars aim to educate sailors about the ISA pathway and help sailors understand their options and choices when graduating through the different sailing classes.

The opening seminar will focus on education of the sailor in areas outside the technical skills of sailing their chosen class. Topics covered at the seminar will include –

The cost of the first weekend seminar is €50 per sailor. 

Published in Youth Sailing
Tagged under

#INFOMAR - Galway’s Marine Institute hosts the 2016 Seminar for INFOMAR – Integrated Mapping for the Sustainable Development of Ireland’s Marine Resource – next Wednesday 19 October.

With a focus on ‘collectively creating an INFOMAR legacy’, the free day-long event will look back on the development and impact of seabed mapping in Ireland, as well as plans for completion of the coastal and shelf-mapping project, and optimising the use and value of knowledge gained from mapping data.

The morning’s two main sessions include a ‘birds eye view’ of mapping the seas of Ireland’s Exclusive Economic Zone, and exploring the latest mapping technology for coastal development and management.

Afternoon presentations will also look at INFOMAR’s role the in energy, infrastructure, environment and education sectors.

The full seminar agenda is online, and free registration is available HERE.

Published in Marine Science

How to sail, sailing clubs and sailing boats plus news on the wide range of sailing events on Irish waters forms the backbone of Afloat's sailing coverage.

We aim to encompass the widest range of activities undertaken on Irish lakes, rivers and coastal waters. This page describes those sailing activites in more detail and provides links and breakdowns of what you can expect from our sailing pages. We aim to bring jargon free reports separated in to popular categories to promote the sport of sailing in Ireland.

The packed 2013 sailing season sees the usual regular summer leagues and there are regular weekly race reports from Dublin Bay Sailing Club, Howth and Cork Harbour on Afloat.ie. This season and last also featured an array of top class events coming to these shores. Each year there is ICRA's Cruiser Nationals starts and every other year the Round Ireland Yacht Race starts and ends in Wicklow and all this action before July. Crosshaven's Cork Week kicks off on in early July every other year. in 2012 Ireland hosted some big international events too,  the ISAF Youth Worlds in Dun Laoghaire and in August the Tall Ships Race sailed into Dublin on its final leg. In that year the Dragon Gold Cup set sail in Kinsale in too.

2013 is also packed with Kinsale hosting the IFDS diabled world sailing championships in Kinsale and the same port is also hosting the Sovereign's Cup. The action moves to the east coast in July with the staging of the country's biggest regatta, the Volvo Dun Laoghaire regatta from July 11.

Our coverage though is not restricted to the Republic of Ireland but encompasses Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales and the Irish Sea area too. In this section you'll find information on the Irish Sailing Association and Irish sailors. There's sailing reports on regattas, racing, training, cruising, dinghies and keelboat classes, windsurfers, disabled sailing, sailing cruisers, Olympic sailing and Tall Ships sections plus youth sailing, match racing and team racing coverage too.

Sailing Club News

There is a network of over 70 sailing clubs in Ireland and we invite all clubs to submit details of their activities for inclusion in our daily website updates. There are dedicated sections given over to the big Irish clubs such as  the waterfront clubs in Dun Laoghaire; Dublin Bay Sailing Club, the Royal Saint George Yacht Club,  the Royal Irish Yacht Club and the National Yacht Club. In Munster we regularly feature the work of Kinsale Yacht Club and Royal Cork Yacht Club in Crosshaven.  Abroad Irish sailors compete in Royal Ocean Racing Club (RORC) racing in the UK and this club is covered too. Click here for Afloat's full list of sailing club information. We are keen to increase our coverage on the network of clubs from around the coast so if you would like to send us news and views of a local interest please let us have it by sending an email to [email protected]

Sailing Boats and Classes

Over 20 active dinghy and one design classes race in Irish waters and fleet sizes range from just a dozen or so right up to over 100 boats in the case of some of the biggest classes such as the Laser or Optimist dinghies for national and regional championships. Afloat has dedicated pages for each class: Dragons, Etchells, Fireball, Flying Fifteen, GP14, J24's, J80's, Laser, Sigma 33, RS Sailing, Star, Squibs, TopperMirror, Mermaids, National 18, Optimist, Puppeteers, SB3's, and Wayfarers. For more resources on Irish classes go to our dedicated sailing classes page.

The big boat scene represents up to 60% of the sail boat racing in these waters and Afloat carries updates from the Irish Cruiser Racer Association (ICRA), the body responsible for administering cruiser racing in Ireland and the popular annual ICRA National Championships. In 2010 an Irish team won the RORC Commodore's Cup putting Irish cruiser racing at an all time high. Popular cruiser fleets in Ireland are raced right around the coast but naturally the biggest fleets are in the biggest sailing centres in Cork Harbour and Dublin Bay. Cruisers race from a modest 20 feet or so right up to 50'. Racing is typically divided in to Cruisers Zero, Cruisers One, Cruisers Two, Cruisers Three and Cruisers Four. A current trend over the past few seasons has been the introduction of a White Sail division that is attracting big fleets.

Traditionally sailing in northern Europe and Ireland used to occur only in some months but now thanks to the advent of a network of marinas around the coast (and some would say milder winters) there are a number of popular winter leagues running right over the Christmas and winter periods.

Sailing Events

Punching well above its weight Irish sailing has staged some of the world's top events including the Volvo Ocean Race Galway Stopover, Tall Ships visits as well as dozens of class world and European Championships including the Laser Worlds, the Fireball Worlds in both Dun Laoghaire and Sligo.

Some of these events are no longer pure sailing regattas and have become major public maritime festivals some are the biggest of all public staged events. In the past few seasons Ireland has hosted events such as La Solitaire du Figaro and the ISAF Dublin Bay 2012 Youth Worlds.

There is a lively domestic racing scene for both inshore and offshore sailing. A national sailing calendar of summer fixtures is published annually and it includes old favorites such as Sovereign's Cup, Calves Week, Dun Laoghaire to Dingle, All Ireland Sailing Championships as well as new events with international appeal such as the Round Britain and Ireland Race and the Clipper Round the World Race, both of which have visited Ireland.

The bulk of the work on running events though is carried out by the network of sailing clubs around the coast and this is mostly a voluntary effort by people committed to the sport of sailing. For example Wicklow Sailing Club's Round Ireland yacht race run in association with the Royal Ocean Racing Club has been operating for over 30 years. Similarly the international Cork Week regatta has attracted over 500 boats in past editions and has also been running for over 30 years.  In recent years Dublin Bay has revived its own regatta called Volvo Dun Laoghaire Regatta and can claim to be the country's biggest event with over 550 boats entered in 2009.

On the international stage Afloat carries news of Irish and UK interest on Olympics 2012, Sydney to Hobart, Volvo Ocean Race, Cowes Week and the Fastnet Race.

We're always aiming to build on our sailing content. We're keen to build on areas such as online guides on learning to sail in Irish sailing schools, navigation and sailing holidays. If you have ideas for our pages we'd love to hear from you. Please email us at [email protected]