When we set out to explore the secrets of the deep sea on our Seamount Expedition, our aim was to survey seamounts, or underwater mountains, using deep sea cameras and record what we found.
After 24 days, we saw seen some incredible things. We recorded the beauty of thriving underwater communities but we also saw the absolute destruction caused by New Zealand bottom trawlers. Hours of footage of coral rubble, a coral graveyard.
We’ve shared some of the first images of this destruction with New Zealand Herald journalist Michael Morrah to publicly reveal the true cost of bottom trawling. You can watch it below.
Even after years of campaigning to protect seamounts and coral, and knowing how the heavy bottom trawling nets bulldoze the seafloor, seeing hour after hour of destroyed coral on this scale was a shock.
The New Zealand bottom trawling fleet is one of the biggest threats to ocean health, at home in the waters of Aotearoa and in the international waters between New Zealand and Australia, where New Zealand is the only country still bottom trawling. Just last year a NZ trawler was caught pulling up 37kg of coral in the Tasman Sea in an area known as Lord Howe Rise.
Coral is absolutely essential to ocean health, and in the deep it can be slow growing and ancient. The coral rubble in this footage is not the result of coral bleaching or climate change, we know it was caused by bottom trawling. We filmed along known trawl tracks.
New Zealanders are onside with ocean protection in the South Pacific high seas and they want bottom trawling banned from seamounts.
When bottom trawling is taken out of the picture, the ocean can recover and thrive. Bottom trawling must go from where it does the most harm.
Call on the Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters to create new global ocean sanctuaries and protect our blue planet.
Sign the petition
