Daily Archives: October 17, 2017
Is the fishing boat stuck on the rocks near Cayucos going to stay there forever?
A Morro Bay commercial fishing boat has been stuck on coastal rocks off the northern coast of Cayucos for more than two months, mired in a jurisdictional limbo as officials from state, federal and county agencies figure out how to remove it — and who’s going pay for it. It may stay there a while. The Point Estero ran aground on July 28 while returning to the Morro Bay Harbor from about 40 miles offshore, where the operator was fishing for slime eels, the Morro Bay Harbor Patrol previously told The Tribune. click here to read the story 21:37
Coast Guard suspends search for missing worker after explosion
The U.S. Coast Guard has suspended their search for a Texas man who disappeared when an oil and gas platform exploded on a lake near New Orleans. Authorities identified 44-year-old Timothy Morrison, of Katy, Texas, as the missing man. He was a subcontractor working on the structure. “The decision to suspend a search is never an easy one,” said Cmdr. Zac Ford. “We send our thoughts and prayers to the Morrison family and all those affected by this incident.” click here to read the story 19:04
This Alaska teen’s biggest catch was a 57-foot whale. Animal-rights activists didn’t like it. He’s not backing down.
He sat on stage, the governor on one side, the lieutenant governor on the other, his parents at the end, and he told a story bigger than the conference room, a story of a life on the wild lands and in the rough seas. Chris Apassingok of Gambell on Monday told how he helped catch a massive bowhead whale in April when he was 16, and how radical animal-rights activists went after him and his family. The whale changed their world. But the critics won’t change how he lives, he told the First Alaskans Institute Elders and Youth Conference, a precursor to the upcoming Alaska Federation of Natives convention. click here to read the story 17:48
Gulf of Alaska cod stocks at all-time lows
Pacific cod numbers in the Gulf of Alaska are at all-time lows, according to early looks at data collected from the 2017 summer survey. Steve Barbeaux, a fisheries biologist for the Alaska Fisheries Science Center in Seattle, said scientists believe that the warm water mass known as the blob may be responsible for the low numbers. “It seems that this warm water that occurred that we’re calling the blob may have increased natural mortality for the 2012 year class and probably 2014, 2015, and 2016 as well,” Barbeaux said. click here to read the story 13:32
Port Saunders fisherman defiant over remarks he made about the FFAW
Despite threats of a lawsuit and a demand for an apology, fish harvester Conway Caines remains defiant in his criticism of FFAW-Unifor. In September, Caines made harsh remarks on VOCM’s “Open Line” program, alleging that the Fish, Food and Allied Workers (FFAW) union is an unlawful enterprise. His accusations of backdoor dealings stem from the 2016 Supreme Court decision in favour of scallop harvesters over the FFAW. The harvesters had sought compensation from the FFAW due to the loss of fishing grounds along the Strait of Belle Isle. click here to read the story 13:12
Planned license lottery draws fire at scallop hearing
One look at the audience at a Department of Marine Resources hearing on new scallop fishing rules last week made it clear that the fishery is getting older. By a good margin, most of the three dozen or so scallop harvesters at Ellsworth City Hall last Wednesday evening had faces lined by years on the water and beards long gone gray.,, In 2009, the Legislature passed a moratorium on new scallop licenses. It also ordered DMR to come up with a lottery system to allow new entrants into a fishery that Brooklin scallop dragger David Tarr describes as a “club. click here to read the story 12:12
Marine Protected Areas – Fishermen say Ottawa not clear on what potential protected areas will mean for fishing grounds
Cape Breton snow crab fisherman Basil MacLean speaks for many in coastal 
when he complains Ottawa has not been clear about what a potential marine protected area (MPA) will mean in his fishing grounds. “We’ve got no clarity. We got no idea what they want to protect,” he says. Earlier this year, officials with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans revealed an area known as the Cape Breton Trough in western Cape Breton is a potential candidate for designation as a marine protected area. The Trough overlaps the lucrative snow crab grounds known in DFO bureaucratise as Area 19. click here to read the story 11:41
Of Shrimp and Petroleum
I am traveling south on Highway 1 through Iberville Parish, Louisiana. I pass fields of sugarcane, chemical factories, strange roadside cemeteries, and what appears to be a combination seafood restaurant and barbershop ambiguously advertising “‘Phresh Cuts.”’ It is Friday afternoon, the start of Labor Day weekend. It is a manageable 87 degrees outside, for now.,,, I’m headed to the annual Shrimp and Petroleum Festival in Morgan City. The festival is the oldest state-chartered harvest festival in Louisiana. It began in 1936 as a single day, when all the shrimp boats in Morgan City would line up in the Atchafalaya River to be blessed by a Catholic priest. In the 1960s, as oil became the dominant industry in town, petroleum was added to the name and the logo became a shrimp in a hard hat wrapped around an oil derrick. by Nick Chrastil click here to read the story 11:02
Petty Officer 1st Class Bill Colclough says, Boater beware: Vessel documentation fraud lurks online
A new scam is targeting boat owners looking to save a little time online, but it’s costing them hundreds of dollars: Websites offering documentation renewal services for a fee. These websites lure boaters with the appearance and convenience of an official government website, but, just because a site looks like the Coast Guard and works like the Coast Guard, that does not mean it’s the Coast Guard. Boaters using these websites can end up spending three times the standard fee, and Coast Guard boarding officers will not accept their vessel’s documentation as valid. Why? Story by Petty Officer 1st Class Bill Colclough click here to read the story 09:46
Fish feud: ITQ’s – Will changes to the West Coast salmon industry hurt or help independent fishermen?
The B.C. salmon fishery keeps resisting a market-based management system. Critics accuse the feds of pitting independent fishermen against corporate giants, but what if this new approach gives the little guy some much-needed financial clout?,,, Thorkelson gets furious thinking about how fishing rights and control, thanks to what she considers a concerted effort by the DFO to impose ITQs, have migrated up the food chain to the likes of Canadian Fishing Co. Part of the Jim Pattison Group, Canfisco is a vertically integrated company that owns licences, quota and fishing vessels in most fisheries on the coast, plus processing facilities in B.C. and Alaska that together handle some 20,000 tonnes of salmon annually. click here to read the story 09:03
Six fishermen feared dead off trawler screamed from inside boat as crewmate clung to hull
SIX fishermen now feared dead were screaming from inside their sinking boat while a crewmate clung to the hull after it capsized off the central Queensland coast. Ruben McDornan survived for 12 hours in heavy seas and before he was plucked to safety after a yacht found him by sheer luck early yesterday. Their boat Dianne overturned near Middle Island, about 20km northeast of the Town of 1770, at 7.30pm on Monday before it sank about midnight. click here to read the story 08:24
Police to resume search for crew of sunken trawler – click here to read the story 17:31
