Marine Wildlife Monitors
From its inception, MMCG’s principals have recognized the importance of fielding reliable mitigation monitors. The combined experience of the principals has allowed them to put together mitigation monitoring teams with unsurpassed records.
MMCG firmly believes that mitigation monitors must have more than academic qualifications. Meeting minimal requirements is not enough, because if the monitors cannot live up to the demands and rigors of field work offshore, the project can be compromised with costly delays.
Regulatory requirements:
| Acts | Permits | Regulations |
| Lead agencies | Policies | Reporting requirements |
General aspects
| Authority of monitors | Working as dedicated team | Working with multinational and multidisciplinary teams |
| Ethics | Difficulty of work, including long watches, sometimes in adverse conditions | Ability to go anywhere on short notice and remain for duration of project |
Potential impacts
| Collision between marine wildlife and ships | Entanglement in project gear | Acoustic impacts from sonar, explosives, pile driving, project noise, etc. |
| Rocket and missile noise, and sonic booms | Oil and fuel releases | Wind farms |
| Mitigation measures to avoid potential impacts |
Monitoring
| Points of contact and chain of command | Communications | Observation platforms |
| Equipment | Data entry forms and protocols | Species identification |
| U.S. Navy Marine Species Awareness Training | Range finding | Daytime monitoring |
| Monitoring with night vision equipment | Passive Acoustic Monitoring (PAM) | Airborne and underwater acoustic measurements |
Briefing
| Pre-project briefing | Project site briefing | Project personnel orientation |
| Review of what can and cannot be done (e.g., ships cannot always stop rapidly) |
We emphatically stress the following safety areas, as appropriate for each project:
General safety:
| First aid, CPR, AED (Automated External Defibrillator) | Oxygen administration | Disease control |
| Personal safety gear | Drills and emergency procedures | Medical certificate of fitness for offshore work |
| Unexploded Ordnance (UXO) |
Basic Offshore Safety Induction and Emergency Training (BOSIET):
| Emergency first aid | Self rescue | Sea survival: cold water survival |
| Helicopter survival: Helicopter Underwater Egress Training (HUET) | Lifeboats: Totally Enclosed Motor Propelled Survival Craft (TEMPSC) | Fire fighting |
Industrial facilities:
| Swing rope and Billy Pugh basket | Compressed air emergency breathing | H2S |
| Slips and falls | Ship-to-ship transfers | Helicopter transfers |
Mission Statement
Our mission is to protect marine wildlife, enabling the success of coastal and offshore projects through careful planning, execution and follow-up.