April 2002

Tiama spent 4 months working for the New Zealand department of Conservation carrying out a variety of tasks in support of their conservation and research programs, including being the main support vessel for an unprecedented 2 week long research dive operation in the Auckland islands.

Tiama sailed from Australia to participate in a peace flotilla against plutonium fuel shipments through the Pacific. Tiama was one of 8 sailing boats from New Zealand and Australia sailing out into the mid Tasman in February 2001 to form a symbolic chain of protest and to promote a nuclear free Tasman. This was followed by a months tour to key southern ports of Australia for Greenpeace.

Two week ocean trial to the remote NZ Kermadec Island group acting as a support vessel to collect geological samples for the Auckland Museum.

We have had the busiest Souther summer season to date,  working with 2 BBC film crews in the sub-Antarctic to  film the mating ritual of the Bullers Albatross when the couple first meet after not seeing each other for a year at sea plus the extreme sight and noise of thousands of small  Sooty Sheer…

  A 1-month charter to the sub Antarctic Antipode Islands south of New Zealand, filming the first sunrise of the new Millenium and broadcasting it with an Inmarsat B directly onto the Internet sending a message to 60.000 people as the first rays of the sun hit the decks.

A busy southern summer season  in the Sub Antarctic  10 departures and returns from NZmost souther port, Bluff. lots of interesting trips including the regular Albatross  research support voyages for the NZ National institute of Water and Atmosphere (NIWA) and providing logistics support for a voyage  to Campbell island for  the biology department of the University of Otago. We also undertook a 2 week voyage to the Auckland islands undertaking…