The third Scotia – a purpose-built, diesel-electric trawler, 224 feet long – was launched in March 1971 from the yard of Ferguson Brothers, Port Glasgow, and commissioned in November that year. Scotia carried out her first trawling trials for the Marine Laboratory in March 1972. She was one of three similar ships; the other two were Cirolana, operated by the Lowestoft Laboratory, and Africana, built in Durban in 1981 for the South African Fisheries Ministry.

Scotia’s early cruises

One of Scotia’s first cruises in 1972 was to West Greenland to investigate the new and growing sea fishery for Atlantic salmon. In the 1960s scientists from the Freshwater Fisheries Laboratory had shown from tagging experiments (in Scottish rivers) that salmon originating in Scotland migrated within the ocean as far as the Faroe Islands and Greenland before returning ‘home’ to spawn. The rise of a large-scale fishery at West Greenland had therefore caused concern for the survival of the fish. Now, as a result of the pioneering work done at Greenland from Scotia and other vessels, the fishery is regulated by quota and, in most years, these quotas are bought out by angling interests and not taken up.

Later in her first year of operation, from September to November 1972, Scotia took on a new but temporary role serving as a support ship off Iceland during the ‘Second Cod War’. Iceland had taken unil-ateral action in extending her fishery limits, but British trawlers continued to fish there under the protection of the Royal Navy, harassed by Icelandic gunboats. Scotia provided medical and technical back-up for those fishing under these difficult conditions. She was fitted out with an emergency operating theatre, where the main computer was later positioned, and a dentist’s chair was installed. The plankton laboratory formed a casualty reception area, with a large cast iron bath full of hot wax (to help revive hypothermia cases). Special showers enabled oil and other contaminants to be washed off injured survivors, and an X-ray facility was set up. Scotia carried a doctor and nurse during this period, but fortunately she never had to deal with anything more serious than toothache or minor cuts.
Young fish surveys

The third Scotia replaced not just the earlier ship of the same name but, particularly from 1984, she also took on the many routine trawling and sampling cruises formerly performed by Explorer, an Arctic trawler which had replaced an earlier ship of the same name in 1956. Her work included surveying the west coast of Scotland and North Sea for young fish, the triennial mackerel surveys, which took the ship from the coast of Norway down to the Bay of Biscay, and acoustic surveys for pelagic species of fish. As fish stocks became more heavily exploited, with some nearing the point of collapse, these independent surveys performed by Scotia became increasingly important to fisheries management.

Final years

Management of Scotia moved forward too, in line with the spirit of the age. In 1991, she was transferred, after public tendering, to be operated by a private company, Marr Vessel Management Ltd, which took over from the Fleet Support Unit of the Scottish Fishery Protection Agency. In May 1998 Scotia was sold to to an Italian company and sailed to Naples for conversion to a survey ship.