Green Team
Defender”, formerly the liveaboard repeated every six months to uncover
Tala. This 37m-long steel hulled vessel trends and patterns in location and
has been renamed and will be refi tted behaviour.
with sampling equipment, wet and
dry laboratories and advanced IT
Red Sea Defender will be a component
capabilities.
part of the second major initiative: The
HEPCA Research Centre, which will be built on the coast at Abu Dabab
The research vessel will be used as a base for fi eld trips, education and during 2010.
outreach programmes throughout the Red Sea. It will be utilised for
undergraduate and postgraduate education and research, marine biology
Independent researcher Dr Elke Bojanowski, who runs the Longimanus
courses and training, as well as local community training schemes for
Project (www.longimanus.info), monitoring and cataloguing oceanic
conservation and tourism related roles. HEPCA describes it as a ‘classroom
whitetip Sharks in the Egyptian Red Sea, is excited by the support that
without walls’ and plan to host scientists and researchers from all over the
HEPCA is showing to researchers. According to her, ‘there has never been
world.
a better time to carry out research in the Red Sea’ and she is ‘looking
forward to making the most of the opportunities that these new
Several educational outreach programmes are already being developed initiatives can bring.’
to utilise the new vessel’s capabilities. These include an intensive one
week course for university students covering the geology, oceanography,
The Red Sea ecosystem has never faced such uncertain times, with
taxonomy of marine species, ecology of marine habitats and threats to
increased tourism, coastal development and the threats of global climate
the Red Sea environment; a programme for schools off ering students the
change. These initiatives will provide a timely opportunity for scientists to
opportunity to experience fi rst-hand aspects of research conservation
protect and conserve the Red Sea through education and research.
and diving operations and, for researchers, the opportunity to take part
Chris Gooda lives in Hurghada and works as a safari guide for blue
in a wide range of sensitive species monitoring and data collection to be
o two. He is interested in Red Sea ecology and has developed a
used for management and protection of key species.
series of presentations to provide guides and guests with more
Its fi rst challenge will be the fi rst marine mammal survey. This will information about the marine environment.
chronicle marine mammals between Marsa Alam and the Sudan border Email
chris.gooda@mac.com.
using hydrophones and ROVs. It’s planned that the survey will be
Issue 5 March - April ‘10
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