Coastal fishing season began today

Coastal fishing began today, and many boats left the pier early this morning. There are now 825 boats at sea around Iceland under remote surveillance by the Icelandic Coast Guard’s command center, Ásgeir Erlendsson, the information officer of the agency, revealed.

He says that there has been a lot of activity at the headquarters of the Institute this morning because of the number of boats that are on the move.

Erlendsson reminds us that all coastal fishing boats must report departure to the Icelandic Coast Guard on VHF channel 9 or with the VSS app. Seaworthiness must also be valid, but no voyage is permitted unless a valid seaworthiness certificate is on board and the crew is legally registered.

A special effort could be made to put in place incentives for individuals and companies to install solar panels, as has been done in many of our neighboring countries.

This is what the report from the working group on alternative energy options, published on Tuesday, shows.

He also notes that on the sea, there is mandatory listening to VHF channel 16.

“The channel is an emergency and call-up channel and therefore seafarers must listen to the channel all the time a ship is at sea. This way other ships and boats, as well as the ICG command center, can make contact on board if needed. This is especially important if an accident occurs because the next ships are possibly the first to rescue. If a radio is set to a “work” channel, then a so-called “dual watch” shall be used to allow the radio to also monitor channel 16,” he says in his answer to a previous question from 200 miles about surveillance on the first day of coastal fishing.