Case 7412 — Firth of Forth Banks Complex NCMPA Areas

The case in brief

This vessel is licensed for static pots/creel and not for scallops, so an apparent-fishing score here cannot be shown to be the banned seabed gear. The gear actually worked on this date is not established.

Case

#7412

Observation

Apparent fishing (satellite vessel tracking)

Closed area

Firth of Forth Banks Complex NCMPA Areas (Offshore Fishing Order 2025)

What is prohibited there

bottom-towed gear prohibited

When

2026-06-25 06:27 UTC → 2026-06-25 07:33 UTC

Position

56.4100°, -1.9565°

Vessel

JENNA MAREE BF78

MMSI

235106178

Flag

GBR

Gear (satellite-inferred)

Trawlers

Length

9.84 m

How this case was judged

Every CAUGHT case is assessed on three independent questions, and the weakest of the three decides. A case reads CAUGHT only when all three are established and a person has reviewed it.

• Activity weak

  Was it fishing, here, and then?

  • No movement analysis on this case — it predates the transit check, so fishing and transiting cannot be separated.

• Vessel strong

  What gear does this boat actually use?

  • This vessel holds a shellfish (pot/creel) entitlement on the MMO licence list, and holds no scallop entitlement.
  • This closure protects the seabed and does not prohibit static pots, so a vessel entitled to work them — and not entitled to tow a scallop dredge — cannot be shown by an apparent-fishing score to have used the banned gear.
  • The entitlement is read from the list for 2026-06, the monthly list in force when this event occurred, not from today's snapshot — unchanged on every list since 2025-01. The flags move — 42 of 4,933 hulls changed this entitlement at least once over the archive window — so the date matters.
  • This is an ENTITLEMENT, not an identification of the gear worked on this date. It establishes that the accusation cannot be made out, not what the vessel was doing.

• Rule strong

  What was prohibited there, then, for that gear?

  • Carve-out recorded: demersal seine permitted here.
  • Demersal mobile gear is prohibited, with an explicit carve-out for demersal seines. The carve-out matters in practice rather than academically: pair-seiners and dual-purpose seiner/trawlers work this ground, and their activity here may be entirely lawful. It is also why this closure cannot be adjudicated from its gear class alone — the instrument has to be read.

Check it yourself

Nothing here asks to be taken on trust. The full report sets out every source, every measurement and everything we could not establish.

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