Fjords are long narrow waterways with steep cliffs along their edges created from glacial movements.  They can be found through much of the land formations closest to the polar regions of the globe.  Norway is particularly known for their large concentration of stunning fjords.  Comprising the western and northern border of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Norway has more than 1,200 fjords along it’s coastline.  As a fishing country these fjords greatly support the country’s environment and economy.  Tourists come from all over the world to see the wonders of Norway’s famous fjords.  But recently the fjords have come under attack from pollution.

All around the world ocean environmentalists are calling for there to be a stop to the dumping of waste in the ocean.  When plastics are dumped in the ocean they stay there forever, clogging up waterways and killing marine life.  For many years Norway has allowed the dumping of trash along it’s coastline.  As a country that has helped pioneer a cleaner living on land this came as a great shock to the world when the effects of trash in Norway’s waters was made vividly clear.  Earlier this year a picture of a dead dolphin washed up on the shores of a fjord sent the social media world into a frenzy.  The dolphin’s gruesome cause of death was clearly from the plastic wrapped around it’s body.

It was a much needed wake up call for the Norwegian government to not only stop the dumping of hazardous wastes in the fjords, but to clean them up as well.  The question became how to effectively manage a cleanup project.  The Oslo Fjord, perhaps the most famous fjord in Norway, runs 62 miles and using trawler boats to cruise the waters with the hopes of dragging up trash in their nets is simply unrealistic.  However thanks to modern technology and the help the Norwegian company, Blueye Robotics, help is on the way.

Blueye Robotics is a firm that deeply wants to share the wonders of the ocean with the world with the creation of a professional level underwater drone.  In 2014 Erik Dyrkoren and Martin Ludvigsen  came together to put their knowledge of marine science and underwater technologies into building the first prototype of the drone that in 2018 would go on to be called the Blueye Pioneer.  According to their website, the motivation behind building this drone was out of the belief “That by empowering people to view, explore and learn about the ocean, people will connect with it and care for it too. This is the reason why the Blueye founders set out on the mission to create and to share the ultimate underwater experience through great product design. Our wish is to let anyone enter the ocean and take part in the element we all come from.”  In 2015 that original prototype was tested on a journey from Africa to Brazil to map micro-plastics and marine litter.

Three years and seven iterations latter, the Blueye Pioneer was ready to ship out world wide.  The Norwegian government has become one of Blueye’s 600 current customers.  The Blueye Pioneer will be tasked with mapping beneath the surface of Norway’s fjords.  Once there is a clear picture of where trash has been congregated divers can go and begin the cleanup process.

The UN recently proposed a global ban on dumping in all oceans.  Countries all over the world are starting to realize the impact that plastics in the ocean has on our worldwide ecosystem and are also beginning to ban companies from dumping plastics in the oceans.  This all paves the way for organizations to begins an effective cleanup process.  With Norway’s Oslo Port Authority being the first to use drones to try cleaning up their fjords there just might be an answer to the the damaging effects we humans have had on our oceans.