Why a sailing vessel?

The Wildlife Trusts Basking Shark Project used an 11.7m sailing vessel, based in Falmouth, Cornwall to carry out the survey work.

Called “Forever Changes”, and built in La Rochelle, France in 1983, she was a fast and stable platform, capable of accommodating up to 8 volunteers and crew at a time. She was also spacious enough to carry the basic stores and equipment required to fulfil her survey role, and the belongings of the liveaboard survey teams.

The Project believed that it was of vital importance to ensure that the surveys had a minimal environmental impact in order to be sustainable. As a sailing vessel, she used the wind as her primary means of propulsion, and the teams sailed her whenever possible, only relying on the engine when there was too little wind to sail, or when manoeuvring in and out of rivers and harbours.

As a result, the average fuel consumption per 5 day survey was 50 litres of diesel, a fraction of what would be consumed by a power driven vessel. Apart from diesel for the engine, the only other fossil energy was an average of 5 kilos of gas for cooking.

Power for all onboard electrical systems came from a bank of four 12 Volt batteries, charged by a high output alternator, driven by the engine. Additional charging comes from a combination of a wind generator and solar panels, that provide "free" power for much of the time.

Forever Changes was also acting as a mobile test bed for a new type of antifouling paint. Normal antifouling paints rely on a combination of copper compounds and biocides to ensure that weed and barnacles do not grow on the hull of a vessel. Fouling creates drag, and so impairs performance and increases fuel consumption, and was therefore to be reduced as much as possible. However, there is concern over the cumulative effect of toxins in these paints leaching into the marine environment.

The paints trialled contained no toxic compounds, relying on being naturally "slippery", so that weed and barnacles cannot remain attached to the hull. Over the last three years the trial paints have dramatically improved in their overall performance, and it is undoubtable that the survey has advanced our knowledge and understanding of environmentally friendly anti-fouling paints.

When perfected the paint system will represent a major benefit to the marine environment, especially in the many rivers and estuaries where high concentrations of pleasure craft are found.