Research Fund 25/06 :: Zoë Fodderie
June 21, 2025
Research Fund 25/07 :: Oriana Bernardo
July 20, 2025
Shortly arrived from its maiden voyage to Morocco, our ‘Mobile Station’ embarked on a nearly 8.000 km journey that began in Peniche, and then drove us 1000 km to L’Oceanogràfic in València, where 4 captive-bred Carcharhinus plumbeus were loaded.
Sharks loaded, it was time to head to HagaOcean, in Stockholm, but, with more than 3000 km in between, our truck drivers needed to take their mandatory 9 hours rest stops, so we parked at Planet Ocean, in Montpellier, Sea Life Oberhausen, and Den Bla Planet, in Copenhagen, enjoying the warm hospitality of our friends and clients, while using their 380 Volts to keep our LSS and cooling unit running.
The sharks were loaded on Wednesday morning, June 25, and arrived in Stockholm 74 hours later, in absolute perfect condition. After an 8 hour wait for closing time, and nearly 2 hours of acclimation, the sharks were transferred to their new home, but something wasn’t quite right. There’s absolutely nothing more horrifying than arriving with healthy animals and seeing things turn to the dark side, which is what, unfortunately, happened. We’re still studying the subject hard, trying to understand what happened, but let’s just say not all 4 sharks survived the introduction to their Swedish home.
On a happier note, we forgot to mention that on Monday, June 23, we also loaded a Mola mola in one of the tanks, which endured the whole trip and was delivered to our friends from Nordsoen Aquarium, in Denmark, on Sunday afternoon, June 29, 140 hours after entering the truck.
It was a long and bittersweet return home by air for the team, and a VERY long drive home for our colleague Gabriel, who drove the A4 all the way back to Peniche and therefore logged 8000 kilometres in less than one week.
We’d love to say that all animals survived, such as the Mola mola and a huge group of ‘gift’ fish we carried to Copenhagen, also loaded 4 days before arrival, but a perfect result was just not in our cards this time.
F#ck.
Still, our ‘Mobile Station’ kept water quality at absolute pristine levels, exactly like it did for Morocco. Regardless of this less than happy result, we can’t wait to take it out on the road again and we obviously want to thank again our friends from EEA Grants and DGPM for their generous funding.
#EEAGrants #EEAGrantsPT #EEANorwayGrants #CrescimentoAzul #BlueGrowth #DGPM
