Daily Archives: June 22, 2023
Kenai Peninsula fisherman Snooks Moore retires from lifelong participation in Alaska commercial fisheries
Homer’s Snooks Moore has spent her life in Alaska commercial fisheries. After 38 years in the salmon drift fishery, the 79-year-old Kenai Peninsula woman will, for the first time, not be heading to Bristol Bay with the F/V Razor’s Edge. “She wanted to keep fishing, but Grandpa wanted to go travel and enjoy life. It’s been about four years that he’s been pushing for it and she finally agreed,” her grandson Justin Arnold, said. The Moore family has been in the Cook Inlet area for many generations and Moore originally started fishing in setnet operations in the Kasilof region. She also participated in the Cook Inlet drift fisheries and then False Pass for several years before heading to summers in Bristol Bay. “My folks had setnet sites on Kalifornsky Beach, where I spent all my childhood, that they bought from my uncle Jack in 1939. They also had some sites closer to the Kenai River,” Snooks Moore said in a conversation on June 7. >click to read< 16:23
Coast Guard medevacs commercial fishing vessel crewmember near Pass a Loutre, La.
The Coast Guard medevaced a commercial fishing vessel crewmember Thursday near Pass a Loutre, Louisiana. Coast Guard Sector New Orleans watchstanders received a call via VHF-FM channel 16 at 4:30 a.m. from the commercial fishing vessel F/V Danna B stating a crewmember was experiencing suspected drug withdrawals symptoms. Watchstanders diverted a Coast Guard Station Venice Response Boat-Medium rescue crew to assist. The rescue crew arrived on scene, transported the crewmember, and transferred him to awaiting emergency medical services personnel back at Station Venice. The crewmember was last reported to be in stable condition. -USCG 13:07
Peter Cook Tells Stories to Remember
Fishing hundreds of miles off the coast of Provincetown in1979, the F/V Little Infant was caught in a raging tempest. Peter Cook, a crewman on the 90-foot scalloper, could see only one other boat out there, the F/V Leland J. “That boat got in trouble,” says Cook, “and started taking on water.” The Little Infant’s crew watched the other boat sink, “and then,” Cook continues, “we picked six guys out of the life raft. Once the six men were on board our boat, I walked into the wheelhouse and Captain Adams said, ‘Well, Pedro, that went well. How are those men?’ He always called me Pedro. And I said, ‘They are shaken up but lucky to be alive, thanks to you.’ He pointed out the window and said, ‘Take a look out there. I’ll bet you never saw anything like that before.’ And the other boat had turned bottoms up and was upside down, drifting away. And I said, ‘No, I never did, George.’ And he said, ‘Well, that’s a story you can tell your grandchildren someday.’ So, I wrote the story.” >click to read< 11:34
Fishermen To Replace NOAA With NEFSA Due to Reliance on Inaccurate Data to Set Catch Quota
NOAA which has the task of managing and safeguarding the nation’s marine resources, sets catch quotas to ensure sustainable fishing practices annually. However, it has been discovered from an investigation that the agency uses heavily outdated and incomplete information to estimate its fish and marine life population, and subsequently set fish catch quotas’ sets quotas for particular species based on data it collects from its research vessels. NOAA’s research vessel for the Northeast and the Mid-Atlantic is the Henry B. Bigelow, homeported in Newport, Rhode Island, U.S.A. A group called the New England Fishermen Stewardship Association (NEFSA), a new coalition of lobstermen, fishermen, and fishing-adjacent businesses was formed as a replacement due to the reported drawbacks of NOAA. >click to read< 10:5
Fishermen File Lawsuit Against Biden Administration, Claiming Regulations are Threatening Their Business
Two fishermen have filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration, claiming that Congress and unelected councils are unconstitutionally regulating and overseeing fisheries. Commercial fishermen George Arnesen of Louisiana and Ryan Bradley of Mississippi argue that the regulatory authority has been placed in the hands of an “unconstitutional regime” that is detrimental to local fishermen. They claim that these regulations make them “vulnerable to capture by narrow private interests.”The lawsuit specifically cites the 1976 Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act as the primary law governing marine fisheries management in U.S. federal waters. The plaintiffs argue that Congress has converted federal waters into “Constitution-free zones,” in violation of the Constitution. >click to read< 09:52
Lone fisherman who fell overboard and drowned was not wearing life jacket
Skipper John Wilson, 64, was alone on the Harriet J off the coast of the Scottish Borders when he fell into the water on the morning of August 28, 2021. A Marine Accident Investigation Branch (MAIB) report found he had probably become entangled in a chain weight in his fishing gear and was pulled through the open door for shooting fishing gear into the sea. The unmanned vessel motored away and shortly afterwards it passed close to another fishing boat, of which one of Mr Wilson’s relatives was the skipper. >click to read< 0855
NJ fishermen told they shouldn’t have received $7M in COVID aid, so give it back
Over three dozen New Jersey fishery-related businesses are being asked to return about $7 million in federal COVID-19 funds that was doled out by the state Department of Environmental Protection, the Office of the State Comptroller said. That number represents 49% of the money that the DEP awarded to fishery businesses for relief money during the peak of the pandemic. The money came out of the CARES Act Marine Fisheries Assistance Grant Program, administered by DEP. The state was given about $14.4 million out of $300 million that the federal government divvied up between 32 states, commonwealths and tribes in the act. It was intended to provide money to fisheries that lost revenue during the height of the pandemic. To qualify, applicants must have experienced at least a 35% loss between March and June of 2020. Video, >click to read< 07:51
