Purchase & Installation of Trawl Monitoring System

Tender description

The Scottish Ministers, Marine Directorate invites tenders for the purchase and installation of a real time, through water, acoustic trawl monitoring system to replace the existing Scanmar trawl monitoring system on our Marine Research Vessel (MRV) Scotia. Lot 1: The MRV Scotia is currently equipped with an obsolete Scanmar ScanBas trawl monitoring system. The current system has been unsupported by the manufacturer for a number of years with no spares available or repairs possible. Our spare ScanBas unit developed a fault a few months ago leaving us with no back up in the event that the remaining unit onboard fails. The current trawl monitoring system provides essential trawl information that allows the trawl net performance to be monitored in real time. These parameters are vitally important in successfully completing any trawl survey. Such a system provides gear parameter information that enables trawl geometry to be calculated as well as displaying and logging trawl depth and temperature data. A trawl monitoring system allows scientists to observe and document the performance of the trawl during deployment and retrieval and alerts scientists to any potential issues that may occur when the trawl is fishing on the seabed. This is a primary piece of equipment that is mandated for use during all of the 5 International Bottom trawl surveys (IBTS) that Marine Directorate (MD) undertakes as well as other similar surveys such as the annual herring acoustic survey (HERAS), the SIAMISS (Science/Industry Anglerfish and Megrim Survey) and also the Scottish Deepwater Slope Survey.