Students call for bay speed limit

A group of students from Australind Senior High School have banded together to reduce the boating speed limit in Koombana Bay to eight knots to protect the bottlenose dolphins from harm.

The Year 9 students, who are part of the Gifted and Talented program, attended the HotRock Perth Student Leadership Conference in August where Dolphin Discovery Centre marine biologist Phil Coulthard spoke and inspired the teenagers to take action on the issue.

The Department of Transport had issued an eight knot speed limit for the bay in June 2010 after safety concerns were raised about floating debris from the Bunbury Timber Jetty, but removed the limit later in the year.

The students said they did not want the dolphins living in the bay to be injured by passing boats nd have advocated a dolphin sanctuary zone.

‘‘We wanted to get the community involved in the petition so we got our friends, family and parents’ workplaces involved,’’ Eve Ruhen said.

‘‘We also took it to the Australind Shopping Centre and got a lot of signatures from Worsley workers.’’

After collecting 379 signatures on the petition, the students handed it over to Mr Coulthard last week.

‘‘Now the discovery centre can continue on with the petition if they want to,’’ Georgia Rowles said.

Australind Senior High School teacher Linda Woodrow said the girls had shown great leadership with the petition.