| When it comes to surfing, those people who are really | | | | founded by New Zealander, Dr Kerry Black, an |
| serious about it will travel half way round the world in | | | | oceanographer who has dedicated a large amount of |
| pursuit of catching the best wave, of achieving that | | | | his life to finding the world's best surf breaks. He |
| trick with their surfboard that they have been | | | | believes the reef will create better surfing waves even |
| hankering after mastering for a lifetime. This can be a | | | | on calm days. |
| costly sport. It's not like you can pop down to your | | | | The intention is to break up the regular form of the |
| local pool or beach and improve your surfing abilities | | | | beach to create waves that you can surf across the |
| with practice. It takes wind, waves and currents to | | | | face off. This is what the new reef will achieve. It is |
| create the right circumstances for surfing. Without one | | | | constructed by using a webbing base and 55 |
| of these elements, you're pretty stumped. | | | | geo-textile bags measuring between 15 and 70 metres |
| There are many areas around the world that are well | | | | long that mirror the effects of a natural reef, pushing |
| known for surfing. Australia, Hawaii and California are | | | | waves upwards and doubling their size. |
| some of the hottest surfing spots around the world | | | | Work on the reef finally started recently by initially |
| and all are a long distance from the UK. British surfers | | | | putting down a mat to minimise the reef sinking into the |
| have, at best, the coast of Cornwall, for their surfing | | | | sand. Straps will be secured together to make a |
| but this doesn't really meet the standards of foreign | | | | webbing base and the first empty geo-textile bags will |
| climes. | | | | be tied together and sewn in place. given that this |
| However, all that could be set to change. An artificial | | | | base is the size of a football pitch, a crane will be |
| surfing reef is being constructed on the coast of | | | | needed to load the mat onto a barge and transported |
| Bournemouth to encourage surfers to that area of the | | | | to its location where it will be put into place by divers. |
| country. The surfers that already favour Bournemouth | | | | Once in place, the empty bags will be pumped full of |
| try to catch waves 153 days per year, even though | | | | sand to create the reef. This whole event will be |
| the local council say there really is only 77 good surfing | | | | repeated twice more for the bottom layer and then |
| days per year - but can you afford to miss them? | | | | two larger sets of bags will be put in place to make |
| The new Bournemouth reef is set 210 metres from | | | | the top layer. |
| the shore and promises to send waves up to 75 | | | | It is promised that the new reef will have no |
| metres high into the sea near Boscombe Pier. This | | | | environmental impact at all. In fact, it may even |
| should double the number of officially good surfing | | | | encourage wildlife to make its home there, thus |
| days, thus improving tourism for Bournemouth. | | | | enriching the marine life in the area. |
| The original price for creating the reef was set at 1.4 | | | | The company are currently constructing a reef in New |
| pounds million but has almost doubled to 2.7 pounds | | | | Zealand which has run into problems with split bags |
| million in the two years that the project has so far | | | | and the whole project is taking longer than originally |
| taken. It is the brainchild of ASR Ltd, a company | | | | expected. |