The big news from Namibia is that we have now begun our research project, and flown the first ever bird-scaring tori lines on a trawler in Namibia.
This honour fell to the MFV Fisherbank belonging to Hangana, a Namibian company that has been very supportive of our work. The crew were fantastic, and really chipped in with the new challenge of deploying and retrieving the tori lines.
As hoped, the tori lines behaved well and really did what was expected - keeping birds from being struck by the warp cables.
We were at sea for 10 days, and luckily had a few days of warm, calm weather with no wind. However, that didn't last and I had to hold on tight during the days when we experienced rough five metre swells.
Unexpected visitor
On this trip I found our work does not always involve birds, when a fruit bat unexpectedly landed on the vessel. We were 80 km off-shore at the time, so quickly rescued the creature to be set free on our return to the north of Namibia where they occur.
I am really looking forward to my next trip that starts next week, so we can carry on this fantasic work saving albatrosses.