Because of problems plaguing three Canadian Coast Guard vessels, fisheries scientists were unable to complete an annual summer survey which has been conducted every year since 1970.
The Coast Guard Ship Alfred Needler was to carry out multi-species bottom trawling and environmental data collection on the Scotia Shelf between Georges Bank and Cape Breton. This information helps scientists predict the size and health of commercial fish stocks. However, the trawl motor and generator burned out when rough seas swamped the machinery with salt water, and as a result, the Needler was unable to complete its mission.
The DFO pressed the Coast Guard’s Teleost into a short survey of the southern Scotia Shelf from Yarmouth to Halifax. Because of prior commitments for the Teleost in the St. Lawrence River, this left two-thirds of the shelf un-sampled. A third Coast Guard Ship, the Hudson, which uses seawater to cool its engines, had to slow down this summer because water temperatures were too high for it to operate at peak efficiency.
This was the second time that the Needler was unable to complete its mission. This repeat failure has promoted the North Atlantic Fisheries Organization (NAFO) to publicly express criticism of the growing unreliability Canada’s aging research vessels. Canada provides data to the organization which says 2017 is the third time in four years that a deep-water survey off Labrador was not covered, and the fifth time in six years a deep-water survey was not covered in southern Newfoundland.
NAFO scientists complain that such data holes make it harder to evaluate trends in biomass and abundance for a number of species.
“There have been instances in the past where we have been unable to do sections of a survey, but we've been usually able to cover most of the area in question,” Kent Smedbol, regional manager of population ecology at DFO Science Maritimes, told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. “This is the first time that a substantial portion of the survey we were not able to complete."
