Sea Alarm is on call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week to provide emergency response assistance. Sea Alarm’s activities in support of a wildlife response are free of charge and only one call away.
Once Sea Alarm is notified that an incident that has occurred, it starts to gather essential information about the incident from a large number of sources. Based on this information, Sea Alarm assesses how it can best provide support under the given circumstances.
Sea Alarm provides the following three levels of assistance:
Level 1 Response: Sea Alarm provides distant advice and coaching by, for example, bringing parties into contact with experts who can provide further advice. Sea Alarm can also facilitate the response by bringing all actors together under one umbrella of coordinated activities. This level of response is in many cases the first stage of Sea Alarm’s response services. If considered necessary, then the response may be upgraded to a level 2 response.
Level 2 Response: Sea Alarm makes an on-site visit. This means that a Sea Alarm expert, accompanied by one or two other experts conducts an on-site assessment to determine if more extended international support is needed. Sea Alarm funds itself in order to do this. Based on the assessment, the response may be upgraded to a level 3 response.
Level 3 Response: Sea Alarm identifies and assists with the mobilization of international resources when required. This could mean that equipment is mobilized, for instance the equipment stored at Oil Spill Response in Southampton. Or it could mean that wildlife response experts or even complete wildlife response teams are mobilized to assist the local response. A level 3 response is only mobilized if adequate funding can be provided. Therefore this stage is dependent upon on the availability of a response budget. Such a budget could be provided by a NGO, a maritime insurer, an intergovernmental body, an oil company, or a local governmental organisation. In relatively small scale responses, Sea Alarm is able to provide its own funding for the mobilization of one or two experts. The most appropriate funding solution is normally found as part of the level 1 or level 2 response activities.