My hometown's local airport has an 8,000G marine tank

[Latte]

Just visited home for Christmas and thought you guys might find this interesting. It's quite a nice set up and has a huge variety of fish - seems to be fish only with some fake coral that honestly looks reasonably realistic if you don't get too close or know much about coral.

The airport itself is pretty tiny - the recent upgrade which added the third gate to the airport was apparently as exciting as the addition that added a baggage carousel probably 10 or 15 years ago (they used to drive our luggage to the side on those big carts they get them off the planes on and everyone would just grab them straight from the source).

I found a page about the tank from the place that installed and maintains it.

The tank is based inside the waiting area in the Proserpine airport, the airport that services the Whitsunday Islands in the Great Barrier Reef. There's a ton of seating around the tank that makes it easy to sit and watch the tank while you wait for your flight. You can view it from the two 10m long sides as well as one end with one of those little domes you can stick your head into (where I took the side on videos from and the above picture).


Here's some videos of the tank I took while waiting for my flight (still waiting as I type this...)

 

[Daniel@R2R]

Wow! Well that's dope!

 

[vetteguy53081]

Wow is all I can say. Id give up my cycle and tots for this

 

[JGT]

Very cool.

 

[Latte]

It's certainly well cared for, has been here for a few years now. I noticed some mussel and clam shells on the bottom so the fish are well fed too

 

[KrisReef]

Can you count how many tangs are in there, I think some folks might be worried.

 

[Latte]

Can you count how many tangs are in there, I think some folks might be worried.

Tang police aside, the stocking looks pretty well done to my inexperienced eyes. The tank has a huge variety of fish and definitely enough to not look bare but no signs of aggression and there's more than enough spaces to hide for any that wanted a little refuge from the mayhem.

 

[KrisReef]

Yup, but I think the fish would be much happier with real coral. Thanks for posting.

 

[Latte]

I mean to say I'm quite impressed by the care and attention that has gone into this tank after years of seeing depressing Chinese restaurant fish tanks (I love Chinese food though...). Sadly the sump and filtration equipment is very well hidden, the side you can't see through has a locked door that I'm guessing hides all the secrets but I did notice one of the return pumps seemed to go through a piece of coral insert (one of my videos showed this) which seemed bizarre to me.

 

[Latte]

Yup, but I think the fish would be much happier with real coral. Thanks for posting.

Is there a genuine difference in fish wellbeing in reef vs FOWLR tanks? I've never thought much of it but I suppose it would make sense. They definitely seemed happy and healthy in this tank and a lot of them were flitting in and out of the coral.



Nothing beats actually replicating their natural ecosystem though I'd guess.

 

[Orphek]

Just visited home for Christmas and thought you guys might find this interesting. It's quite a nice set up and has a huge variety of fish - seems to be fish only with some fake coral that honestly looks reasonably realistic if you don't get too close or know much about coral.

The airport itself is pretty tiny - the recent upgrade which added the third gate to the airport was apparently as exciting as the addition that added a baggage carousel probably 10 or 15 years ago (they used to drive our luggage to the side on those big carts they get them off the planes on and everyone would just grab them straight from the source).

I found a page about the tank from the place that installed and maintains it.

The tank is based inside the waiting area in the Proserpine airport, the airport that services the Whitsunday Islands in the Great Barrier Reef. There's a ton of seating around the tank that makes it easy to sit and watch the tank while you wait for your flight. You can view it from the two 10m long sides as well as one end with one of those little domes you can stick your head into (where I took the side on videos from and the above picture).


Here's some videos of the tank I took while waiting for my flight (still waiting as I type this...)

Thanks So much for sharing about . .
Can. It see the video from phone but Now I remember this tank .
This tank is lighted by 6 x Orphek Amazonas 960 .

 

[Latte]

Thanks So much for sharing about . .
Can. It see the video from phone but Now I remember this tank .
This tank is lighted by 6 x Orphek Amazonas 960 .

They certainly do a great job, the lighting was really quite nice - of course it is a FOWLR tank so wouldn't have the same requirements as a reef. Still, very nice stuff!