Tag Archives: Alaska Wildlife Troopers
Horror on an Alaska fishing boat when a young crewman gets pulled into the sea
A 21-year-old fisherman died after his gear dragged him into the water in Southwest Alaska, officials said. Commercial fishing crewmember Corwin Wheeler fell from the boat in Kvichak Bay Friday, while fishing salmon. A mayday call reported him overboard at 12:31 pm, spurring a rescue operation. Officials said Wheeler first became tangled in his fishing gear, before being pulled overboard and into the water. Tributes have since poured in for the young angler, headed by his father. According to his social media, Corwin lived in Madison, and was born in Salem. Photos show him happily working the Bering Sea, as a salmon fisherman for Alaskan Leader Fisheries. Photos, more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 14:10
Crewmember on Bristol Bay fishing vessel dies following net entanglement
A commercial fishing crewmember in Western Alaska died Friday after he was swept up in fishing gear and taken into the water, according to the Alaska State Troopers. In a dispatch on Saturday, Troopers identified the victim as 21-year-old Corwin Wheeler of Wisconsin. Troopers began a rescue effort shortly after noon Friday upon receiving a mayday call from a fisherman in Kvichak Bay, a body of water near Naknek, part of the Bristol Bay Borough. more, >>CLICK TO READ<< 06:47
Updated: Crew member on Alaska factory trawler dies after possible ammonia exposure
A crew member on an American Seafoods factory trawler died at sea last week, likely from an ammonia leak on board. U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer Second Class John Highwater said that they received a satellite call from the Northern Eagle at about 4 a.m. on Aug. 18. “One of their crew members was found unresponsive in one of their engineering spaces,” Highwater said. “They believe there was an ammonia leak somewhere in the vessel that caused the person to fall unconscious.” Jeremy Baum, the Alaska Wildlife Trooper stationed in Unalaska/Dutch Harbor, identified the crew member as First Engineer David Kumah from Ghana in West Africa. >click to read< 13:09
Wildlife Troopers to crack down on ‘performance-enhancing’ add-ons to Bristol Bay boats
Commercial drift gillnet boats must measure 32 feet or less to fish in the bay. And the fleet got a finger-wagging from the Alaska Wildlife Troopers earlier this year — a reminder to keep their boats within that limit. Wildlife trooper Capt. Aaron Frenzel said they fielded more complaints than usual about big vessels last year. So after the season, they went over to boat yards in King Salmon and Naknek to see what was going on. “A lot of the stuff is below the waterline that we can’t see… while we’re out on the water inspecting vessels,” he said. “So we started seeing some areas that just kind of expanded.” >click to read<, 18:40
Charges filed against vessel operator for illegal trawling near Kodiak, Alaska
The State of Alaska filed criminal misdemeanor charges May 12 against a vessel operator for operating non-pelagic trawl gear within the Kodiak, Alaska, ground fish registration area. The trawl gear used in the area had attached to it chafing gear and chain rib lines suitable for fishing in contact with the seabed, all devices not authorized for legal pelagic trawl gear. A multi-agency law enforcement team embarked aboard Coast Guard Cutter Naushon boarded the trawler near Kodiak, Alaska, March 16, and issued several significant fisheries violations. “In response to the boarding, NOAA opened an investigation into the vessel for fishing in federal waters closed to non-pelagic trawl gear around Kodiak,” said Phillip Null, supervisory enforcement officer, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Office of Law Enforcement (NOAA OLE). >click to read< 15:27
Bristol Bay drift gillnetters face boat inspection
Bristol Bay commercial salmon drift gillnet permit holders have been advised by the Alaska Wildlife Troopers of upcoming inspections during the summer fishery to determine whether participating vessels are adhering to current vessel length regulations and if crews are fishing legally. Ongoing efforts by some participants in this fishery to amend current regulations to allow innovations that give them a harvesting advantage have yet to be approved by the Alaska Board of Fisheries, and no more proposals will be considered by the board before that season begins. Current state fisheries regulations limit drift gillnetters to 32 feet in overall length with few exceptions, which were carefully identified in a letter sent to every gillnet permit holder in the Bristol Bay fishery. >click to read< 09:27
Seiner ordered to pay $24K in fines and restitution for illegal 2019 harvest
Alaska Wildlife Troopers report that 41-year old Jasper Allbrett entered an agreement with the Office of Special Prosecutions to plead guilty to a pair of misdemeanor counts of commercial fishing in closed waters. Allbrett was fined $30,000 with $20,000 suspended and ordered to pay restitution of $14,700. He’ll serve two years on probation, and his seine permit will be suspended for one year. >click to read< 12:49
Ex-lobbyist enlists former Fish & Game official to fight charges of illegal seining
The 12-hour purse seining opener began at 7 a.m. on September 2, 2021 in Silver Bay. Alaska Wildlife Troopers cited five people on four vessels for allegedly fishing in closed water. Robert Thorstenson Jr., who goes by Bobby, was among a group of seiners cited on September 2 during a 12-hour opener in Sitka’s Silver Bay Terminal Harvest Area. “The last thing I wanted was a ticket,” the Juneau-based fisherman said. “So I call the trooper to me and I asked him where I could legally fish, and he told me where I could legally fish. So I went over there and set there, and then he came over and wrote me a ticket.” >click to read< 09:16
Southeast Alaska fishing boat captain admits to dumping 8 tons of waste overboard
A Southeast Alaska fishing boat captain has admitted to dumping eight tons of sandblasting waste into the ocean. According to the plea agreement filed in federal court Monday, Brannon Finney admits to violating the federal Clean Water Act. Finney, 32, has signed the plea agreement, which goes before a judge next month at her sentencing hearing. The plea agreement says Finney repainted her boat, the F/V Alaskan Girl, in Wrangell in June of 2017. Most of the debris was sandblasting material, but it also included copper slag from removing the Alaskan Girl’s old paint, and the paint chips themselves, the plea agreement says. >click to read<10:50
Four are charged with illegal commercial fishing in Dog Fish Bay.
The state has filed charges against four commercial fishermen accused of illegal harvesting salmon in a bay south of Homer. Alaska Wildlife Troopers wrote in a dispatch Monday that Eric Winslow, 61, Paul Roth, 35, and Mark Roth, 64, all of Homer, and Robert Roth, 39, of Anchor Point, are charged with working together to illegally drive salmon out of a closed area near the mouth of a creek in Dog Fish Bay into an open fishing area, where they harvested them. Altogether, 33,328 pounds of salmon were illegally harvested, according to the dispatch. >click to read<08:42
The Whale Pass Case: Southeast Alaska fishermen illegally caught $35,000 worth of sea cucumbers, troopers say
The lure of lucrative echinoderms may have proved too strong for three Southeast fishermen. The trio, all from Naukati Bay on Prince of Wales Island, face criminal charges after pilfering nearly four tons of sea cucumbers from a Whale Pass scientific preserve that’s been off limits to fishing for decades, Alaska Wildlife Troopers say.,, The Whale Pass case started in December after other divers noticed the three men bringing in large loads of sea cucumbers,,, “They’re like, how in the world is this guy catching more than us? We don’t even see him out here. Something isn’t right,” >click to read< 20:06
Fishing for Felony
Not often do Alaska’s notorious fish wars take a turn toward jail. Usually they are the source of much stomping and snorting at public meetings, and maybe some gunwale banging at sea. Most often they feature angry set-gillnet fishermen snarling at anglers or troll fishermen ranting against purse seiners and drift gillnetters, or subsistence fishermen mad at everyone not a subsistence fishermen. Rarely, almost never, do these battles turn violent. Unprecedented is the only word to describe a violent encounter at sea that features as the villian a friendly young woman who stars in her own music video and is locally known for her prowess as a downhill skier. >click to read< 09:09
Petersburg crabber fined for using others’ pot tags
A Petersburg crabber was fined this week for using other permit holders’ crab pot tags and fishing more pots than he’s allowed. 54-year-old Andy Knight was originally facing six misdemeanor charges. He was fishing for Dungeness crab in his vessel the Kathy K in Gambier Bay on southern Admiralty Island north of Petersburg just after the start of the summer season June 17th. Alaska Wildlife Troopers from the Juneau post onboard the trooper vessel Sentry investigated and say Knight was fishing more than the maximum of 300 pots allowed for him and two other permit holders onboard. click here to read the story 10:56
Ten Day At Sea Joint Mission Successfully Tallies 20+ Violations
On March 10, 2016, two Alaska Wildlife Troopers, a public safety technician, and a NOAA Enforcement Officer got underway for a 10-day at-sea operation in the Aleutian chain, Alaska. The joint patrol mission was focused on conducting at-sea boarding’s, as well as inspections of state and federal commercial fishing vessels and processors operating in the Gulf of Alaska. What they thought would be a relatively smooth mission, turned into much more than they bargained for. With days of 40 knot (46 MPH) winds, 10-15 foot seas, and snow, “it was more than I’m used to,” said Enforcement Officer Noah Meisenheimer of the NOAA Office of Law Enforcement Office. Aboard the State of , the crew wasn’t in imminent danger. But, on day eight of the nearly 1,300 nautical mile trek, a nearby vessel was. It was a particularly stormy evening when the vessel Stanley K had its anchor wrap around the propeller. By the end of the at-sea patrol, the Stimson team had successfully conducted this rescue mission, inspected more than 100 cod pots, boarded for examination 35 commercial vessels, and audited four seafood processors. In total, eight federal and 13 state violations were documented. Read the rest here 14:51
Deadliest Catch Skipper Elliot Neese was in Unalaska District Court this week for Catching Undersized Crab
Two boat captains were in Unalaska District Court on Thursday after being caught with undersized red king crab. Thirty-two-year-old Elliot Neese is the captain of the F/V Saga. The vessel was cited during a delivery of red kings last week. Dockside samplers found that 3.3 percent of the crab on board was illegal — either too small, or female. Read the rest here 16:29
Two California Men Plead Guilty to Fishing Violations in Sitka – They paid for it too!
It was on June 30th that Alaska Wildlife Troopers contacted the captain and crew of the fishing vessel “Chief Joseph” while it lay at anchor in Still Harbor in Southeast Alaska. When they did so, they observed signs of recent fishing aboard the vessel. Read more here 15:52
Alaska Wildlife Troopers do job without discriminating – Col. James E. Cockrell
Protecting Alaskans and their wildlife resources is the mission of the Alaska Wildlife Troopers. This mission is executed fairly and equally with no discrimination to any group. I wish to respond to the letter to the editor signed by Fred Basargin, Dennis Basargin and others alleging “not all fishermen treated equally.” [email protected] 09:44
