September 2021
MY INVOLVEMENT WITH EYESEA Cath Robertshaw, COO, EYESEA As a former teacher, I have always enjoyed new challenges. Being involved in Eyesea, where we aim to vastly improve the current state of the oceans, allows me to make a real tangible difference. It is a challenge I could not pass by. I had left Asia to return ‘home’ to the Isle of Man, a small island surrounded by beaches and the Irish Sea. I had hiked around our island, following the ‘Raad Ny Foillan’, which translates from Manx into ‘The Flight of the Seagull’ and saw first hand, the importance of the UNESCO heritage biosphere status the Island has and the fragile balance between man and nature. My time in Singapore and my links into the maritime community led me to Eyesea’s Founder, Graeme Somerville-Ryan. Working with Graeme for his company, Escorial Consulting, led to chats about our current homes, the state of the world and what good the shipping industry could do. He and Oliver Schwarz from Chart World, a leading maritime mapping tech company, got talking and realized they had an opportunity to make a real difference in our understanding of pollution and hence EYESEA was born.
pollution, hazards at sea and on land anywhere in the world. We then integrate the data collected into maritime charts, maps and will support ocean, harbour, coastal clean-ups and scientific research. Eyesea’s goal is to use this crowdsourced environmental and navigational hazard data to work with communities on behavioural change and clean-up actions.
I was brought onboard and had a fair few ideas, a ton of enthusiasm and got stuck in with such gusto that I was soon offered the role of COO. I was delighted as I so passionately believe in the concept of the Eyesea App, which allows the user to take photographic data of
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