There is, I am told from locations around the country, a shortage of Shipwrights and that this is creating problems for boat repairs. On the next edition of my monthly Podcast, to be issued on Friday, July 5, I’ll be discussing this with a family that has a great boat building and shipwright tradition in that wonderful maritime area of Dublin Port, East Wall and Ringsend. Do tune in.This Newsletter highlights chosen maritime developments.
DUBLIN IS A VERY SAFE PORT, recognised by the International Harbour Masters Association which has members in 50 countries and has given Dublin its ‘Safe, Efficient & Secure Port Award.’ Dublin Port’s Harbour Master and also Chairman of Dublin SafePort, Captain Michael McKenna, is justifiably pleased. “We have some 50 ship movements in the port and 11,000 on the port roads each day,” he says “and we are opening up parts of the Port to the public through a range of cultural initiatives, across which safety remains a top priority as we link the port culturally and through its history, to the city.”
SOAP FROM THE SMALL SCHOOL COMMUNITY WITH A BIG HEART Lisheen is best-known nationally for the success of its oarsmen, the O’Donovan brothers and now the National School in the West Cork village is producing soap from Carrigeen Moss collected from the local beach. Fourth, fifth and sixth classes are the ’Class of the Year’ in the All-Ireland Junior Entrepreneur Programme for their seaweed soap business. They collected, washed and dried Carrigeen Moss from the strand after learning about its anti-oxidant, soothing and moisturising properties. They also designed a label for the soap. A good way to teach children about the values of what can be found on the ocean’s edge!
AS PART OF ITS 200TH CELEBRATIONS, the first venue for the RNLI anniversary exhibition is the National Maritime Museum in Dun Laoghaire where it will be until Saturday, July 27, after which it will move to Belfast.
TWO OF THE WORLD’S MOST REMARKABLE MARITIME PROPERTIES have sold at auction in the UK for over a million pounds each, which is about a fifth of the price that it cost the previous owner to buy and refurbish them as hotels. The new owners of Spitbank Fort and No Man’s Fort, dating back to the 1870s when Britain feared a French attack on the strategic dockyards at Portsmouth, have not been disclosed. They were sold at a Savills auction. Photo – Savills
40 MILLION YEARS AGO AND A THOUSAND MILE RIVER – Geologists have discovered in the ice sheet of West Antarctica the remains of an ancient river system that once flowed for nearly a thousand miles. The giant river system existed 40 million years ago according to findings published in the journal Science Advances.
THE LITHUANIAN SHIPPING INDUSTRY is becoming one of the first to build a hydrogen-electric powered ship. The construction of the country’s first hydrogen-electric ship is underway at Western Baltija Shipbuilding, comissioned by the Klaipeda State Seaport Authority, a harbour craft designed for waste management. Photo -Klaipeda State Seaport Authority
THE US COAST GUARD INVESTIGATION INTO THE LOSS OF THE TITAN submersible which happened on June 18 last year will take longer than expected due to several factors, including the need for two salvage missions to the remote North Atlantic to gather evidence.
THE HIGH SEAS ALLIANCE HAS started a campaign to reach 60 ratifications needed for ‘High Seas Treaty’ protecting biodiversity beyond national jurisdictions so that it can be brought into force by the United Nations Ocean Conference which will be held next June in France. It was adopted by Member States last June but needs the formal adoption at the Ocean Conference.
Do keep in touch. Email to: tommacsweeneypodcast@gmail.com My Maritime Podcast is on all major Podcast platforms and on my website: https://tommacsweeneymaritimepodcast.ie
Fair sailing
