Luke Edney

Florida has taken a real beating during the most recent hurricane season and it's hit many boat owners the hardest. Every news bulletin that has covered the recent storms has shown the devastating effect of the storm on the local boating community.

Boatbreakers are had an interesting week as the team featured on Quest's new series Scrap Kings for the first time. The new show aims to showcase different companies in the scrap business across the UK.

At Boatbreakers we were recently contacted by someone studying for his masters who thesis is based on the issue of boat disposal in the UK and the current End of Life processes in place to deal with old boats.

Canada is the latest country to try and tackle the problem of abandoned boats littering their waterways. It was recently announced by Transport Canada that they will be looking for people to take part in their Abandoned Boats Program.

Abandoned boats are a growing global problem. Boatbreakers focus our efforts on the UK and Europe but across the Atlantic there is a similar problem occurring. At Boatbreakers we often get enquiries from American boat owners who are looking to dispose of their end of life vessel in a responsible manner.

End of Life Boats are a problem that won't just go away. During the last sixty years, the marine industry has been churning out increasing numbers of recreational and working craft, the majority being fibreglass (glass fibre reinforced polyester).

At Boatbreakers we want to start making more noise about the growing issue of boat recycling. We feel that the marine industry is about to wake up to the fact that something must be done to deal with the thousands of boats that are or will soon become floating scrap. If you are a boat owner, boat lover, or boat blogger we want to hear what you have to say.

Another article from the NautiExpo e-magazine site that we've recently enjoyed reading. This time the article focuses around the Dutch practices of boat recycling.

At Boatbreakers we always enjoy reading articles written about the subject of Boat Recycling. Recently we came across two articles on the NauticExpo e-magazine site that we found to be an interesting read.

Boatbreakers were recently called by a marine surveyor to come and recover a fire damaged scrap boat from Pyrford Marina in Surrey. The boat was a Freeman 22 riverboat which was completely gutted by the blaze.

It's not an unusual sight to see boats in people's front gardens, especially on the South Coast. However, when the boat is a 37ft fin keel yacht it becomes quite an imposing landmark. The boat had been in her current position since 2006 when she was taken out of the water and onto the stand so her owner could carry out repair works to her.

Seeing an old wooden boat scrapped is always a sad sight, even for us at Boatbreakers. But sometimes the problems with them and the costs far outweigh the value, so if nobody wants her it's time to be scrapped.