The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) has recently announced that it will again make four places available for external participants on the 2-day introductory course on oiled birds course, which will take place in February 2009.
Dispersing wild animals from a site that is threatened by oil is a useful approach that could avoid a lot of damage amongst wildlife in the aftermath of an oil spill. The newly published Bird Hazing Manual gives wildlife specialists a step-by-step guide to a wide
range of techniques and strategies.
A training exercise is being planned to test the preparedness of Sea Alarm"s Global Response Network. Scheduled to take place in early January 2009, various responders will be called to enquire about their availability, actual mobilisation time and the length…
Oil Spill Response will work together with the Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre in Ostend to test the filtering system of the newly developed wildlife fastanks. Three fastanks, which run on one filter system, will be transported to Ostend, where they will be used for several months in the rehabilitation of oiled birds.
The Irish Seal Sanctuary (ISS) is a professional marine wildlife rescue organisation entirely run by volunteers from a private back garden. To carry on and expand their rescue and rehabilitation work, a purpose built facility is urgently needed. Funding for the new Marine Conservation and Education Centre has been identified, the site and planning permission have been approved and the plans have been drawn up. Now all that remains is for Fingal County Council to confirm their financial contribution to the project. Recent signals however suggest that the Council is reconsidering to withdraw from their former commitments, which would blow the project.
The next Interspill Conference will be held in Marseille, France on 12-14 May 2009. Sea Alarm is pleased to announce that it will co-chair the session on Environmental Impacts and Restoration. It will also host an exhibition booth where it will provide information on its activities and those of other wildlife response organisations.
Sea Alarm has developed training modules for oil spill response experts, which have been integrated into the training courses that OSRL/EARL offers to oil companies.
The oiled wildlife response equipment that is stockpiled at the Oil Spill Response‘s warehouse in Southampton (UK) was recently inspected by leading European responders, including Sea Alarm.
The cargo ship Fedra ran aground on 10 October 2008 off the east side of Gibraltar’s Europa Point with 370 tonnes of fuel oil on board. Within hours, the Oil Spill Response team was on site in Gibraltar to assist and advise local teams. Sea Alarm was put on standby, in case a wildlife emergency emerged.
Sea Alarm is pleased to have joined EuroSpill in November 2008 as a founding member.
HELCOM RESPONSE is moving swiftly forward to integrate oiled wildlife response in its activities. Sea Alarm and WWF-Finland have been an integral part of the process.
The Reducing the Impact of Oil Spills (RIOS project), which is funded by DG Research and started in April 2007, is in its final stage of completion. The main objective of the project is the development of an action plan for future research in the area of rehabilitation of oiled animals.