The only specialised marine publication in Oceania that focuses on the maritime industry, from super yachts to small craft to large commercial ships, including coastal shipping, tugs, tow boats, barges, ferries, tourist, sport-fishing craft
Issue link: https://viewer.e-digitaleditions.com/i/48969
WATERWAYS – Waterfront Business Somali pirates finally release hostages In brief… Coroner critical of maritime law The father of Genevieve Lewis, aged nine, who was killed by a speedboat on Lake Taupo in January 2009, says he is pleased with a coroner's call for a "serious reform" of maritime laws. Genevieve was killed while she was waterskiing behind her parents' boat. John James Curtis, the Wellington real estate agent who was driving the boat which ran over Lewis, was fined $3000 and ordered to pay $20,000 in reparations after he pleaded guilty to operating a boat causing unnecessary danger. The coroner, Wallace Bain, said maritime laws needed to be brought into line with road transport laws. "In my view, the current penalties or charges that can be laid against people responsible for deaths of another person as a result of a maritime activity needs serious reform." Genevieve's father, Guy Lewis, of Eketahuna, said the only charge available under maritime law didn't recognise Genevieve had been injured, let alone had died. New premises for safe ship company Maritime Management Services, New Zealand's first safe ship management company, has moved to 50 Argo Drive, Half Moon Bay, Auckland. The company was formed in 1993 following the establishment of the SSM system by the Maritime Safety Authority (now Maritime New Zealand). MMS clients range from fishermen in small dinghies to major ferry companies, and include owner-operated charter vessels, rescue vessels and aquaculture barges. Its team of 18 surveyors and auditors service clients throughout New Zealand, including the Chatham Islands. The company also undertakes audits and insurance inspections, both nationwide and internationally. It holds a current ISO9001:2008 certificate. Untouched sandspit in safe hands The Department of Conservation is to buy Northland's Ngunguru Sandspit, a ribbon of sand at the northern end of Ngunguru Bay. The nationally significant spot is one of only a small number of sandspits around New Zealand that are relatively unspoilt. "There have been numerous attempts to acquire the sandspit into public ownership since the early 1970s, but all had failed," said EDS policy director Raewyn Peart. "It is great to see innovative approaches taken, such as this, to achieve that end." SOMALI PIRATES HAVE freed the oil tanker MT Polar and her crew after holding them hostage since October 30, 2010. The ship's owners, the Greek company Paradise Navigation, said the Polar was on her way to a safe port, but declined to say if a ransom was paid to secure the ship's release. Other sources report the pirates received US$7.7 million. "This was a long and extremely distressing hijack for all the families involved and those in the company trying to secure their release," said a spokesman for the company. He said the international community was not doing enough to stop piracy. "Owners and managers find it unacceptable that they were virtually left unaided to deal with these criminal acts on the high seas." One seaman died of a stroke three weeks after the ship was seized in the Indian Ocean, but the remaining 23 crew members were said to be well. According to the Piracy Reporting Centre, the incident began when the ship GREENPEACE TUNA CAMPAIGN CRITICISED THE CAMPAIGN BY Greenpeace on the use of fish aggregating devices or FADs in tuna purse seine fisheries highlighted the organisation's unwillingness to understand effective fisheries management, according to the chief executive of the New Zealand Seafood Council, Peter Bodeker and the New Zealand Sport Fishing Council. The council said despite quoting figures from the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation on bycatch rates, Greenpeace had not worked with the foundation to improve tuna fishing techniques. Bodeker said effective fisheries management was mostly contingent on ensuring catch rates were appropriate. "For highly migratory species, like tuna, good fisheries management requires cooperation through regional organisations. Regulations governing fishing practices, such as the use of FADs, may well be part of the measures adopted." Bodeker said New Zealand's seafood industry supported the West and Central Pacific Fisheries Commission and the quota management system. The industry was working to cut the bycatch of juvenile tuna and other species. "The key to achieving sustainable fisheries is about more than the use (or not) of FADs, as Greenpeace would have the public believe," he said. Coast gets new marine reserves FIVE NEW MARINE reserves to be established on the West Coast of the South Island will include the two of the largest off the main islands, the Minister of Conservation Kate Wilkinson and the Minister of Fisheries, Phil Heatley, said on August 29. The five new reserves are Kahurangi (spanning 8466ha), Okarito (4641ha), Punakaiki (3558ha), Gorge (847ha) and 42 Professional Skipper November/December 2011 a small educational site at Ship Creek near Haast (16ha), a total of 17,528ha. Kahurangi and Okarito would be the largest marine reserves on the country's mainland coast. Bottom trawling, dredging and Danish seining will also be banned from another 9557ha of ocean adjoining the Punakaiki and Gorge marine reserves under the Fisheries Act. was 633 miles east of Socotra Island, off Somalia, while en route from St Petersburg to Singapore with a cargo of fuel oil. She had been held since the beginning of April at Ceel Caduur, on the coast of central Somalia. The pirates used an Iranian fishing vessel they had previously captured to take over the tanker. The fishing boat's captain allegedly received money from the pirates and was released with his vessel and crew. The negotiations appeared to have been completed and a release operation was expected in August. However, renewed differences within the pirate group delayed negotiations, partly because of a disagreement on how any ransom might be paid.