Archive 2005

Third Conference a success

The Third Sea Alarm Conference took place in Balbriggan, Ireland, November 1-3, 2004, and was organised by Sea Alarm and the Irish Seal Sanctuary. The conference, which was sponsored by Fairy, ITOPF, WWF, Fingal County Council, The Heritage Council, Dublin Port and National Car Rental, was attended by 37 delegates from 26 organisations and 8 countries. The theme of the Conference, “Towards greater preparedness for oiled wildlife response in Europe” was discussed in four sessions:

• Recent incidents and lessons learnt, with presentations on the Erika incident (France, 1999), Prestige incident (Spain, 2002), Tricolor incident (Belgium, 2003), Fu Shan Hai incident (Sweden, 2003), Rocknes (Norway, 2004), Mystery Spill (Germany, 2004).
• National preparedness, with examples from Shetland, Ireland, Belgium, France
• Preparedness at an international level, where the activities of internationally operating organisations were presented, including IPIECA’s Oil Spill Working Group, Oil Spill Response Limited, International Fund for Animal Welfare, Sea Alarm, International Oil Pollution Compensation Fund.
• Final session, in which conclusions were drawn. A Final Declaration was adopted.
  

The Proceedings of the Conference were published May 2005.

IPIECA Guide for Oiled Wildlife Response Planning

The latest issue in IPIECA’s Report Collection on Oil Spill Preparedness and Response (Volume 13) has been published and is now available via www.ipieca.org.

Chris Morris, General Secretary of IPIECA writes in the inside front cover: “This volume in the IPIECA report series was prepared under contract by the Sea Alarm Foundation (Director: Hugo Nijkamp) and was funded by contributions from BP, Total and IPIECA. The document represents a unique stage on the road to integrated,consistent, oiled wildlife contingency planning, and has required many disparate organisations and agencies to reach a consensus on best practices, techniques and approaches for oiled wildlife response. The result is a tribute to the flexibility and cooperation of all the contributors, as well as the Sea Alarm Foundation for creating an environment in which this could occur.”

During the Third Sea Alarm Conference in Balbriggan, the Guide was presented, and first copies were given to the European Commission and the International Maritime Organisation.