European Commissioner Visits Marine Stands at Galway Science & Technology Festival

Ms. Maire Geoghegan-Quinn, European Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science, paid a visit to the exhibition stands of both the Marine Institute and the Galway Explorers education and outreach programme at the Galway Science and Technology Festival held in NUI Galway recently.

 

Picture: Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn is presented with a copy of the new marine atlas by Dr. John Joyce of the Marine Institute.(Photo - courtesy NUIG Press Office)

The Festival, which drew a crowd estimated at over 20,000 people, ran for one day only on Sunday 21st November.  

While at the Festival, Commissioner Geoghan-Quinn was presented with a copy of the Atlas of the Deep Water Seabed, Ireland – a detailed compilation of stunning three-dimensional imagery featuring the submarine canyons, underwater mountains and abyssal plains that make up Ireland’s seabed territory, an area ten times that of our land mass. The atlas was compiled by University College, Cork from data gathered as part of the Irish National Seabed Survey (INSS) and INFOMAR inshore seabed survey undertaken by the Geological Survey of Ireland (GSI) the Marine Institute and partners,

 

 

The Commissioner also viewed underwater footage of cold-water coral reefs taken by the remotely-operated vehicle ROV Holland 1 off the Porcupine Bank west of Ireland.  

 

Colette Lavin and Padraig Creedon of Galway Atlantaquaria with Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn on the Explorers marine education stand (Photo - courtesy NUIG Press Office)

 

 

On the Explorers stand, the Commissioner heard how this innovative primary school education  programme now includes 46 schools in the west of Ireland, from Mayo to Clare and has recently been launched in the Dublin area, where six schools from Dublin to Wicklow are taking part.  

 

ENDS