A Seattle–based factory trawler that experienced an ammonia leak was undergoing repairs near Alaska’s Dutch Harbor this week after three people were treated for inhalation of fumes of the toxic substance.
The incident occurred aboard the 353-foot Excellence, where two welders and a vessel engine room chief were affected by the ammonia, according to the Coast Guard and the online newspaper The Dutch Harbor Telegraph.
The vessel is owned by Premier Pacific Seafoods of Seattle.
The Coast Guard said the vessel was towed to Wide Bay, some 7 miles from the city of Unalaska, for repairs. Once the repairs are completed, their work will be inspected by the Coast Guard’s Marine Safety Detachment at Dutch Harbor.
Officials said an unknown amount of ammonia was released, with a full potential of 20,500 pounds onboard the Excellence. The fire department initially established an exclusion zone around the vessel and sprayed down the vessel with water in an attempt to reduce the fumes emanating from the Excellence.
Veteran newsman James Mason, owner/editor of the Dutch Harbor Telegraph, said a crewmember who he spoke with told him a pipe in the engine room broke just where it entered a valve. Vessel personnel were able to shut that part of the system down, then headed back to Dutch Harbor to unload the catch and get a certified ammonia welder to fix the pipe. Some 135 people on board were safely evacuated.
The vessel tied up at Kloosterboer, an international cold storage firm, and it was there that the three workers suffered effects from inhaling ammonia while trying to repair the vessel.
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Concern Over Spill Cleanup Readiness Prompts Lawsuit
As Shell Oil’s drill rigs head for the Arctic, with plans to drill offshore this summer, litigation has been filed in federal court in Anchorage challenging the federal government’s decision to approve oil spill response plans for such drilling programs.
The lawsuit, filed July 10 by a coalition of conservation groups, names as defendants Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and two other Interior department officials.
While critical of the federal government’s decision to approve Shell Oil’s spill response plan, the suit does not name Shell as a defendant.
The plaintiffs, represented by Earthjustice, include the Alaska Wilderness League, Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace, National Audubon Society, Natural Resources Defense Council, Oceana, Ocean Conservancy, Pacific Environment and Sierra Club.
“We cannot allow the future of the Arctic Ocean to be risked on the hope that nothing will go wrong,” the conservation groups said in a written statement.
Shell Oil spokesman Curtis Smith said that company remains confident that the process followed to approve their oil spill response plan was extremely thorough and will have no problem withstanding legal review.
“Regulators at the highest level have looked very closely at these plans, they have confidence in the plans and if they did not, we would not be on the doorstep to drilling in Alaska,” he said.
Mike LeVine, an attorney with Oceana, said the lawsuit’s aim is to protect the Arctic Ocean and make sure the law is upheld when oil spill response plans are approved.
The lawsuit alleges that the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act were violated when the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement and the Interior Department approved spill cleanup plans for the Beaufort and Chukchi seas.
The lawsuit, filed July 10 by a coalition of conservation groups, names as defendants Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and two other Interior department officials.
While critical of the federal government’s decision to approve Shell Oil’s spill response plan, the suit does not name Shell as a defendant.
The plaintiffs, represented by Earthjustice, include the Alaska Wilderness League, Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace, National Audubon Society, Natural Resources Defense Council, Oceana, Ocean Conservancy, Pacific Environment and Sierra Club.
“We cannot allow the future of the Arctic Ocean to be risked on the hope that nothing will go wrong,” the conservation groups said in a written statement.
Shell Oil spokesman Curtis Smith said that company remains confident that the process followed to approve their oil spill response plan was extremely thorough and will have no problem withstanding legal review.
“Regulators at the highest level have looked very closely at these plans, they have confidence in the plans and if they did not, we would not be on the doorstep to drilling in Alaska,” he said.
Mike LeVine, an attorney with Oceana, said the lawsuit’s aim is to protect the Arctic Ocean and make sure the law is upheld when oil spill response plans are approved.
The lawsuit alleges that the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act were violated when the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement and the Interior Department approved spill cleanup plans for the Beaufort and Chukchi seas.
APU Fisheries Science Program Immerses Students In Research Projects
For students immersed in Alaska Pacific University’s marine biology research programs in Anchorage, it may be a long trek to class and their biggest textbook won’t fit in their backpacks.
That’s because their classroom is likely a real beach, far from the Anchorage campus, and that textbook is the ocean.
Just ask graduate student Sarah Webster, who is engaged in Pacific halibut research on the Kenai Peninsula, or Danielle Verna, who is studying ballast tanks in oil tankers in Valdez.
The whole idea, says Brad Harris, assistant professor of marine biology at APU, is to get students directly involved in research projects that directly serve local, state, national and international research needs.
“We work primarily on fishery species life history, stock assessment, age and growth, mortality and recruitment, habitat assessment and fishing gear performance,” said Harris. “We assess the interactions of fisheries regulations on fishing communities and on fishery by-catch conflicts.”
The work of students and faculty at APU’s Applied Fisheries Science Laboratory is supported through a variety of federal, state and private industry grants and partnerships, Harris said. At present these include grants from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the At-Sea Processors Association and partnerships with a broad range of state, federal, academic and private groups, he said. These include the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, NOAA Fisheries, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the University of Massachusetts and the Smithsonian Institute.
The faculty reaches out to build relationships with private industry and government agencies, while teaching students to try to think out how to develop a principle-based framework for research before conflict arises, he said.
APU’s Applied Fisheries Science Laboratory is currently engaged in more than a dozen research projects, partnered with federal and state agencies and other universities.
More information about the APU fisheries program is at http://www.alaskapacific.edu/academics/environment/marine-biology
That’s because their classroom is likely a real beach, far from the Anchorage campus, and that textbook is the ocean.
Just ask graduate student Sarah Webster, who is engaged in Pacific halibut research on the Kenai Peninsula, or Danielle Verna, who is studying ballast tanks in oil tankers in Valdez.
The whole idea, says Brad Harris, assistant professor of marine biology at APU, is to get students directly involved in research projects that directly serve local, state, national and international research needs.
“We work primarily on fishery species life history, stock assessment, age and growth, mortality and recruitment, habitat assessment and fishing gear performance,” said Harris. “We assess the interactions of fisheries regulations on fishing communities and on fishery by-catch conflicts.”
The work of students and faculty at APU’s Applied Fisheries Science Laboratory is supported through a variety of federal, state and private industry grants and partnerships, Harris said. At present these include grants from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the At-Sea Processors Association and partnerships with a broad range of state, federal, academic and private groups, he said. These include the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, NOAA Fisheries, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the University of Massachusetts and the Smithsonian Institute.
The faculty reaches out to build relationships with private industry and government agencies, while teaching students to try to think out how to develop a principle-based framework for research before conflict arises, he said.
APU’s Applied Fisheries Science Laboratory is currently engaged in more than a dozen research projects, partnered with federal and state agencies and other universities.
More information about the APU fisheries program is at http://www.alaskapacific.edu/academics/environment/marine-biology
Thursday, July 5, 2012
Anomaly or Harbinger? Massive dock float from Japan, teeming with invasive species, beaches itself in Newport
By Terry Dillman
A dock as big as a good-sized commercial fishing vessel washed shore in Agate Beach near Newport, Oregon on June 4, and has since caused quite a stir among scientists, government officials and curiosity seekers.
It also brought potential implications for Pacific Northwest commercial fisheries.
The 165-ton steel-and-concrete dock float – one of four ripped from their moorings at the Port of Misawa by the massive tsunami that inundated Japan in March 2011 – teemed with non-native plant and animal marine species, known collectively and colloquially as invasive species.
How the gigantic piece of flotsam – 66 feet long, 19 feet wide, and seven feet high – rode the waves and currents for several thousand miles undetected until it neared Oregon’s central coast is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. The tsunami marine debris coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said even something that size floating amid the currents, winds and waves of the vast Pacific Ocean is quite difficult to monitor, even with satellites.
Whether it’s an anomaly or a harbinger of what lies ahead for Pacific Northwest shores as an estimated 1.5 million tons of tsunami debris wends its way across the ocean on the whims of wind and currents also remains uncertain. But such debris poses a certain threat for a number of reasons.
Commercial fishery leaders worry about the size and distribution of debris in terms of navigational hazards and equipment entanglement. Other issues are the possibility of radiation (although NOAA officials said the chances are slim to none) and chemical contamination. Then there are the potential costs of cleaning up tons of debris. But the dock’s June 4 arrival focused attention on another clear threat: alien flora and fauna.
The first hint that the dock had journeyed from Japan was found in a species of algae indigenous to Asia, including Japan.
Jessica Miller, an Oregon State University (OSU) marine ecologist, said brown algae commonly known as wakame covered much of the dock. She said the algae is native to the western Pacific Ocean in Asia, and has invaded several regions including southern California. OSU phycologist Gayle Hansen confirmed the species identification.
The examination by scientists uncovered a plaque bolted to the dock commemorating its June 2008 installation. The Japanese consulate in Portland, Oregon traced its origin to the Aomori Prefecture on the northern tip of Japan’s coast. Used for loading fish into trucks, the dock is one of four the titanic tidal wave carried out to sea. Japanese officials say one showed up a few weeks later on an island south of Misawa. The other two are still missing.
Scientists at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center (HMSC) said millions of organisms hitched a ride aboard the ersatz island that beached on Oregon’s central coast – dozens of species of barnacles, starfish, urchins, anemones, amphipods, worms, mussels, limpets, snails, solitary tunicates and algae.
John Chapman, an OSU marine invasive species specialist, called the organisms’ survival of their trek across the Pacific Ocean “mind-boggling,” noting that the low productivity of open ocean waters should have starved at least some of them. “It’s as if the float drifted over here by hugging the coasts, but that’s impossible,” Chapman said. “Life on the open ocean, while drifting, may be more gentle for these organisms than we initially suspected. Invertebrates can survive for months without food, and the most abundant algae species may not have had the normal compliment of herbivores. Still, it is surprising.”
Chapman said the float “is unlike any transoceanic debris we have ever seen. Drifting boats lack such dense fouling communities, and few of these species are already on this coast. Nearly all of the species we’ve looked at were established on the float before the tsunami. Very few came after it was at sea.”
Full Alert
Invasive marine species are already a major problem on the West Coast, where they usually are introduced from ship ballast water.
Chapman is well aware of the issue, having for many years studied a parasitic isopod infesting and decimating mud shrimp populations in estuaries from California to Vancouver Island, with potentially dire consequences for the health of those estuaries. In 2010, an aggressive invasive tunicate appeared in Winchester Bay and Coos Bay along the southern Oregon coast. It’s on the state’s most dangerous species list and is both an ecological and economic threat because of its ability to spread and choke out native marine communities, said OSU’s Sam Chan, chair of the Oregon Invasive Species Council.
Researchers say it’s difficult to assess how much of a threat the newly arrived organisms represented. And there was no way they could tell if any of the hitchhikers aboard the float had already moved into nearshore waters.
“We have no evidence so far that anything from this float has established on our shores,” said Chapman. “That will take time. However, we are vulnerable. One new introduced species is discovered in Yaquina Bay, only two miles away, every year. We hope that none of these species we are finding on this float will be among the new discoveries in years to come.”
Possibilities are many and varied.
“Among the organisms we found are small shore crabs similar to ours that look like the same genus, but may be a different species,” she said. “There were also one or more species of oysters and small clam chitons, as well as limpets, small snails, numerous mussels, a sea star and an assortment of worms.”
As future debris arrives, it could bring additional species, they noted. Yet this dock could also be unique, because it is debris that was submerged in Japan and had a well-developed sub-tidal community. Researchers say that this situation could prove relatively rare, given the amount of debris that entered the ocean.
“Floating objects from near Sendai can drift around that coast for a while before getting into the Kuroshio current and then getting transported to the eastern Pacific,” Chapman said. The researchers want to find funding to go to Japan to sample similar floats and compare the biological life on them with that on the transoceanic traveler that ended up on Agate Beach.
State officials took no chances, following procedures designed to minimize potential spread of non-native species.
Personnel from Oregon State Parks and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife scraped away all plants and animals from the dock onto a tarp, stuffed them into large plastic garbage bags and buried it all in an eight-foot deep hole beyond the reach of high tides and storm surges. Without saltwater, the plants and animals cannot survive, officials noted. They used propane torches to sear any remaining traces of life still clinging to the dock float.
As of press time, two options were under review for taking care of the dock itself: either towing it off the beach to a nearby port or harbor or demolishing it onsite and disposing the remains in a landfill.
One major question remained. If a piece that size could show up far sooner than scientists expected, what lies ahead?
Flotsam and Jetsam
The Japanese government estimated that the 2011 tsunami washed about 5 million tons of debris into the ocean, 70 percent of which quickly sank. Every year, tons of flotsam coagulate into swirling trash heaps – dubbed “garbage patches” by oceanographers – within ocean gyres (locations where the water spins like a whirlpool without the downward spiral; they just sit and spin). Recent monitoring indicates that at least some of the tsunami debris would pull away and get caught in one of those north Pacific gyres.
NOAA monitored the debris field for about a month before it dispersed too widely for satellites to track. Initial tracking had the 1,000-mile debris trail traversing the sea at a rate of about 10 miles per day.
Scientists aren’t sure how much of the remaining 1.5 million tons is still afloat. Using computer models, NOAA researchers believed that most of the remaining debris wouldn’t reach the Pacific Northwest coast until next year. Using today’s form of “dead reckoning” – computer modeling of winds and currents – scientists say most of the debris that survives the journey would likely strike Oregon and Washington in 2013 and 2014, despite concerns about flotsam invasions as early as autumn 2012. Much of it, they said, might never get here.
Most still stick with that assessment, although winds, currents, tides and waves can alter the equation.
During a briefing in January at HMSC, representatives from NOAA, Oregon Parks and Recreation Department, OSU, local emergency management agencies and others outlined the situation for Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
The unexpected arrival of the behemoth float prompted Wyden to renew his call for NOAA and other federal and state agencies to enhance efforts to track the debris, noting the danger such big pieces pose to sea traffic, including commercial fishermen. Safety at sea and on shore is the primary concern.
It prompted Wyden to urge officials to develop a response plan that “prepares for the worst while hoping for the best” in a letter to NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco. “Because the potential for damage to Oregon’s fishing, crabbing, shipping and tourism industries is a major concern, it is vital that federal, state and local agencies and outside organizations work together to get ahead of this issue,” he wrote. “This kind of broad-scale cooperation and coordination at every level is crucial to minimizing overlap and ensuring that accurate information is available to everyone who could come in contact with this debris, be it on water or on the beaches.”
The float was the second-largest piece of flotsam to show up from the tsunami. The waves dislodged the 164-foot shrimping vessel Ryou-Un Maru from its mooring in Hokkaido, Japan, where it awaited scrapping. The unmanned vessel drifted across the Pacific Ocean until the US Coast Guard sank it in April in the Gulf of Alaska after deciding it was a threat to shipping and the state’s coastline.
Tragic Reminder
The scientists said the dock float’s arrival is also a sobering reminder of the 2011 tragedy that cost thousands of lives.
“We have to remember that this dock, and the organisms that arrived on it, are here as a result of a great human tragedy,” Miller said. “We respect that and have profound sympathy for those who have suffered, and are still suffering.”
A dock as big as a good-sized commercial fishing vessel washed shore in Agate Beach near Newport, Oregon on June 4, and has since caused quite a stir among scientists, government officials and curiosity seekers.
It also brought potential implications for Pacific Northwest commercial fisheries.
The 165-ton steel-and-concrete dock float – one of four ripped from their moorings at the Port of Misawa by the massive tsunami that inundated Japan in March 2011 – teemed with non-native plant and animal marine species, known collectively and colloquially as invasive species.
How the gigantic piece of flotsam – 66 feet long, 19 feet wide, and seven feet high – rode the waves and currents for several thousand miles undetected until it neared Oregon’s central coast is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma. The tsunami marine debris coordinator for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said even something that size floating amid the currents, winds and waves of the vast Pacific Ocean is quite difficult to monitor, even with satellites.
Whether it’s an anomaly or a harbinger of what lies ahead for Pacific Northwest shores as an estimated 1.5 million tons of tsunami debris wends its way across the ocean on the whims of wind and currents also remains uncertain. But such debris poses a certain threat for a number of reasons.
Commercial fishery leaders worry about the size and distribution of debris in terms of navigational hazards and equipment entanglement. Other issues are the possibility of radiation (although NOAA officials said the chances are slim to none) and chemical contamination. Then there are the potential costs of cleaning up tons of debris. But the dock’s June 4 arrival focused attention on another clear threat: alien flora and fauna.
The first hint that the dock had journeyed from Japan was found in a species of algae indigenous to Asia, including Japan.
Jessica Miller, an Oregon State University (OSU) marine ecologist, said brown algae commonly known as wakame covered much of the dock. She said the algae is native to the western Pacific Ocean in Asia, and has invaded several regions including southern California. OSU phycologist Gayle Hansen confirmed the species identification.
The examination by scientists uncovered a plaque bolted to the dock commemorating its June 2008 installation. The Japanese consulate in Portland, Oregon traced its origin to the Aomori Prefecture on the northern tip of Japan’s coast. Used for loading fish into trucks, the dock is one of four the titanic tidal wave carried out to sea. Japanese officials say one showed up a few weeks later on an island south of Misawa. The other two are still missing.
Scientists at OSU’s Hatfield Marine Science Center (HMSC) said millions of organisms hitched a ride aboard the ersatz island that beached on Oregon’s central coast – dozens of species of barnacles, starfish, urchins, anemones, amphipods, worms, mussels, limpets, snails, solitary tunicates and algae.
John Chapman, an OSU marine invasive species specialist, called the organisms’ survival of their trek across the Pacific Ocean “mind-boggling,” noting that the low productivity of open ocean waters should have starved at least some of them. “It’s as if the float drifted over here by hugging the coasts, but that’s impossible,” Chapman said. “Life on the open ocean, while drifting, may be more gentle for these organisms than we initially suspected. Invertebrates can survive for months without food, and the most abundant algae species may not have had the normal compliment of herbivores. Still, it is surprising.”
Chapman said the float “is unlike any transoceanic debris we have ever seen. Drifting boats lack such dense fouling communities, and few of these species are already on this coast. Nearly all of the species we’ve looked at were established on the float before the tsunami. Very few came after it was at sea.”
Full Alert
Invasive marine species are already a major problem on the West Coast, where they usually are introduced from ship ballast water.
Chapman is well aware of the issue, having for many years studied a parasitic isopod infesting and decimating mud shrimp populations in estuaries from California to Vancouver Island, with potentially dire consequences for the health of those estuaries. In 2010, an aggressive invasive tunicate appeared in Winchester Bay and Coos Bay along the southern Oregon coast. It’s on the state’s most dangerous species list and is both an ecological and economic threat because of its ability to spread and choke out native marine communities, said OSU’s Sam Chan, chair of the Oregon Invasive Species Council.
Researchers say it’s difficult to assess how much of a threat the newly arrived organisms represented. And there was no way they could tell if any of the hitchhikers aboard the float had already moved into nearshore waters.
“We have no evidence so far that anything from this float has established on our shores,” said Chapman. “That will take time. However, we are vulnerable. One new introduced species is discovered in Yaquina Bay, only two miles away, every year. We hope that none of these species we are finding on this float will be among the new discoveries in years to come.”
Possibilities are many and varied.
“Among the organisms we found are small shore crabs similar to ours that look like the same genus, but may be a different species,” she said. “There were also one or more species of oysters and small clam chitons, as well as limpets, small snails, numerous mussels, a sea star and an assortment of worms.”
As future debris arrives, it could bring additional species, they noted. Yet this dock could also be unique, because it is debris that was submerged in Japan and had a well-developed sub-tidal community. Researchers say that this situation could prove relatively rare, given the amount of debris that entered the ocean.
“Floating objects from near Sendai can drift around that coast for a while before getting into the Kuroshio current and then getting transported to the eastern Pacific,” Chapman said. The researchers want to find funding to go to Japan to sample similar floats and compare the biological life on them with that on the transoceanic traveler that ended up on Agate Beach.
State officials took no chances, following procedures designed to minimize potential spread of non-native species.
Personnel from Oregon State Parks and the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife scraped away all plants and animals from the dock onto a tarp, stuffed them into large plastic garbage bags and buried it all in an eight-foot deep hole beyond the reach of high tides and storm surges. Without saltwater, the plants and animals cannot survive, officials noted. They used propane torches to sear any remaining traces of life still clinging to the dock float.
As of press time, two options were under review for taking care of the dock itself: either towing it off the beach to a nearby port or harbor or demolishing it onsite and disposing the remains in a landfill.
One major question remained. If a piece that size could show up far sooner than scientists expected, what lies ahead?
Flotsam and Jetsam
The Japanese government estimated that the 2011 tsunami washed about 5 million tons of debris into the ocean, 70 percent of which quickly sank. Every year, tons of flotsam coagulate into swirling trash heaps – dubbed “garbage patches” by oceanographers – within ocean gyres (locations where the water spins like a whirlpool without the downward spiral; they just sit and spin). Recent monitoring indicates that at least some of the tsunami debris would pull away and get caught in one of those north Pacific gyres.
NOAA monitored the debris field for about a month before it dispersed too widely for satellites to track. Initial tracking had the 1,000-mile debris trail traversing the sea at a rate of about 10 miles per day.
Scientists aren’t sure how much of the remaining 1.5 million tons is still afloat. Using computer models, NOAA researchers believed that most of the remaining debris wouldn’t reach the Pacific Northwest coast until next year. Using today’s form of “dead reckoning” – computer modeling of winds and currents – scientists say most of the debris that survives the journey would likely strike Oregon and Washington in 2013 and 2014, despite concerns about flotsam invasions as early as autumn 2012. Much of it, they said, might never get here.
Most still stick with that assessment, although winds, currents, tides and waves can alter the equation.
During a briefing in January at HMSC, representatives from NOAA, Oregon Parks and Recreation Department, OSU, local emergency management agencies and others outlined the situation for Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
The unexpected arrival of the behemoth float prompted Wyden to renew his call for NOAA and other federal and state agencies to enhance efforts to track the debris, noting the danger such big pieces pose to sea traffic, including commercial fishermen. Safety at sea and on shore is the primary concern.
It prompted Wyden to urge officials to develop a response plan that “prepares for the worst while hoping for the best” in a letter to NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco. “Because the potential for damage to Oregon’s fishing, crabbing, shipping and tourism industries is a major concern, it is vital that federal, state and local agencies and outside organizations work together to get ahead of this issue,” he wrote. “This kind of broad-scale cooperation and coordination at every level is crucial to minimizing overlap and ensuring that accurate information is available to everyone who could come in contact with this debris, be it on water or on the beaches.”
The float was the second-largest piece of flotsam to show up from the tsunami. The waves dislodged the 164-foot shrimping vessel Ryou-Un Maru from its mooring in Hokkaido, Japan, where it awaited scrapping. The unmanned vessel drifted across the Pacific Ocean until the US Coast Guard sank it in April in the Gulf of Alaska after deciding it was a threat to shipping and the state’s coastline.
Tragic Reminder
The scientists said the dock float’s arrival is also a sobering reminder of the 2011 tragedy that cost thousands of lives.
“We have to remember that this dock, and the organisms that arrived on it, are here as a result of a great human tragedy,” Miller said. “We respect that and have profound sympathy for those who have suffered, and are still suffering.”
Wild Alaska Salmon Run Picks Up Speed
Cold, nasty, rainy weather hovered over Alaska’s famed Bristol Bay salmon fishery on the eve of Independence Day, as the commercial catch began to pick up speed – with some four million sockeyes harvested just from June 29 through July 2.
Still, state fisheries biologists said they don’t know yet how it will all add up. What they were saying, from their offices in King Salmon and Dillingham, is that it’s too early to tell yet whether the run is going to be late and whether it will come in overall as weak or strong.
Area management biologist Slim Morstad at King Salmon described the weather as nasty and raining, with temperatures in the low 40s, but he said that through July 2 the bay-wide harvest had reached some six million sockeyes. That’s quite a jump from June 29, when the Alaska Department of Fish and Game calculated the preliminary overall Bristol Bay salmon harvest at 2,038,000 fish.
The overall statewide harvest figures have taken a small leap since the June 29 report which had a total harvest of 9,449,000 salmon, including 7,133,000 reds, 1,971 chum, 265,000 pink, 69,000 kings and 10,000 silvers.
At Emmonak, on Western Alaska’s Lower Yukon River, Kwik’Pak’s Jack Schultheis said the commercial harvest that began June 29 was strong and the summer run of the famed oil-rich Yukon chum salmon looking good, although they were probably a little bit past the mid-point of the run. Schultheis said fishermen manning about 150 small boats in area Y-1 harvested some 16,000 chums on June 29, another 13,000 chums on July 1 and another 14,000 chums on July 2. A little further up the river, in area Y-2, harvesters in another 93 boats brought in an additional 7,000 chums.
The Copper River district run, now past its peak, was still attracting an estimated 75 to 100 drift gillnet permit holders. The cumulative Copper River harvest as of June 29 stood at 1.32 million sockeye and 11,4000 Chinook Salmon. That compared with a historical 5-year cumulative harvest average of 782,107 sockeye and 17,107 kings for that date.
For Prince William Sound overall, the preliminary catch data showed a harvest of 3.1 million salmon, including more than two million reds and more than one million chum, plus some 12,000 kings.
The harvest for the Alaska Peninsula stood at 2,042,000 salmon, including 1.5 million reds, 343000 chum, and 203,000 pink, while at Kodiak, fishermen had harvested 852,000 salmon, including 661,000 reds, 163,000 chum and about 3,000 kings. In the south side of the Alaska Peninsula, the harvest stood at 2 million salmon, including 1.5 million reds, 343,000 chum and 203,000 pink, plus some 7,000 Chinooks.
Still, state fisheries biologists said they don’t know yet how it will all add up. What they were saying, from their offices in King Salmon and Dillingham, is that it’s too early to tell yet whether the run is going to be late and whether it will come in overall as weak or strong.
Area management biologist Slim Morstad at King Salmon described the weather as nasty and raining, with temperatures in the low 40s, but he said that through July 2 the bay-wide harvest had reached some six million sockeyes. That’s quite a jump from June 29, when the Alaska Department of Fish and Game calculated the preliminary overall Bristol Bay salmon harvest at 2,038,000 fish.
The overall statewide harvest figures have taken a small leap since the June 29 report which had a total harvest of 9,449,000 salmon, including 7,133,000 reds, 1,971 chum, 265,000 pink, 69,000 kings and 10,000 silvers.
At Emmonak, on Western Alaska’s Lower Yukon River, Kwik’Pak’s Jack Schultheis said the commercial harvest that began June 29 was strong and the summer run of the famed oil-rich Yukon chum salmon looking good, although they were probably a little bit past the mid-point of the run. Schultheis said fishermen manning about 150 small boats in area Y-1 harvested some 16,000 chums on June 29, another 13,000 chums on July 1 and another 14,000 chums on July 2. A little further up the river, in area Y-2, harvesters in another 93 boats brought in an additional 7,000 chums.
The Copper River district run, now past its peak, was still attracting an estimated 75 to 100 drift gillnet permit holders. The cumulative Copper River harvest as of June 29 stood at 1.32 million sockeye and 11,4000 Chinook Salmon. That compared with a historical 5-year cumulative harvest average of 782,107 sockeye and 17,107 kings for that date.
For Prince William Sound overall, the preliminary catch data showed a harvest of 3.1 million salmon, including more than two million reds and more than one million chum, plus some 12,000 kings.
The harvest for the Alaska Peninsula stood at 2,042,000 salmon, including 1.5 million reds, 343000 chum, and 203,000 pink, while at Kodiak, fishermen had harvested 852,000 salmon, including 661,000 reds, 163,000 chum and about 3,000 kings. In the south side of the Alaska Peninsula, the harvest stood at 2 million salmon, including 1.5 million reds, 343,000 chum and 203,000 pink, plus some 7,000 Chinooks.
Peer Review on Draft Bristol Bay Watershed Assessment
An independent panel of peer review scientists will gather in Anchorage Aug. 7-9 to examine the draft Bristol Bay watershed assessment that will figure in the future of major mine development like the Pebble mine at the headwaters of Bristol Bay.
Meanwhile, the Environmental Protection Agency is accepting comments through July 23 on what everyone thinks about the draft assessment and their thoughts on what else should be considered before the final assessment in completed.
Supporters of the mine say it can be safely developed and proceed in harmony with Bristol Bay fisheries. Opponents say it would have adverse effects that would be harmful to salmon habitat, affecting not only the salmon but the people and wildlife who depend upon it.
Depending on the conclusions drawn in the final assessment, the EPA could invoke a section of the Clean Water Act that would inhibit development of the mine.
Opponents and proponents of the mine have been quick to respond.
Ron Thiessen, president and chief executive officer of Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd., in Vancouver, British Columbia, a partner with Anglo American PLC in the Pebble Partnership, said this week that the EPA’s draft charge to peer reviewers is artificially narrow and will prohibit the peer reviewers from fully assessing whether the scope, methodology, underlying assumptions, data sources and analysis presented in that report are adequate to achieve the assessment’s stated purpose.
“We should all be very clear,” he said.
“This report is seeking to pass judgment on the development potential of America’s single greatest resource of copper, gold and molybdenum before any mine plan has been prepared or any permit application filed.”
Mine opponents, including Kim Williams, executive director of Nunumta Alukestai (Caretakers of the Land) responded to the Pebble Partnership’s criticism that the EPA had not given more consideration to the PLP’s extensive environmental baseline document.
“If Pebble wants their data peer reviewed, they should have it peer reviewed as a totally separate document,” Williams said. Getting it peer reviewed would be a good thing, she said, but not as part of the watershed assessment. That, she said, is the PLP’s job, not the EPA’s to do.
The EPA has posted online all the information the agency has on the subject to date, plus instructions on how to submit those comments, at http://yosemite.epa.gov/R10/ECOCOMM.NSF/bristol+bay/bristolbay.
Meanwhile, the Environmental Protection Agency is accepting comments through July 23 on what everyone thinks about the draft assessment and their thoughts on what else should be considered before the final assessment in completed.
Supporters of the mine say it can be safely developed and proceed in harmony with Bristol Bay fisheries. Opponents say it would have adverse effects that would be harmful to salmon habitat, affecting not only the salmon but the people and wildlife who depend upon it.
Depending on the conclusions drawn in the final assessment, the EPA could invoke a section of the Clean Water Act that would inhibit development of the mine.
Opponents and proponents of the mine have been quick to respond.
Ron Thiessen, president and chief executive officer of Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd., in Vancouver, British Columbia, a partner with Anglo American PLC in the Pebble Partnership, said this week that the EPA’s draft charge to peer reviewers is artificially narrow and will prohibit the peer reviewers from fully assessing whether the scope, methodology, underlying assumptions, data sources and analysis presented in that report are adequate to achieve the assessment’s stated purpose.
“We should all be very clear,” he said.
“This report is seeking to pass judgment on the development potential of America’s single greatest resource of copper, gold and molybdenum before any mine plan has been prepared or any permit application filed.”
Mine opponents, including Kim Williams, executive director of Nunumta Alukestai (Caretakers of the Land) responded to the Pebble Partnership’s criticism that the EPA had not given more consideration to the PLP’s extensive environmental baseline document.
“If Pebble wants their data peer reviewed, they should have it peer reviewed as a totally separate document,” Williams said. Getting it peer reviewed would be a good thing, she said, but not as part of the watershed assessment. That, she said, is the PLP’s job, not the EPA’s to do.
The EPA has posted online all the information the agency has on the subject to date, plus instructions on how to submit those comments, at http://yosemite.epa.gov/R10/ECOCOMM.NSF/bristol+bay/bristolbay.
ASMI Says International Marketing Investment is Paying Off Well
Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute will spend some $8.5 million this year on international marketing of the state’s wild seafood products, from salmon to red king crab and groundfish, in an effort to increase the overall value of the fisheries.
ASMI is trying to build on last year’s effort, which saw seafood exports jump 35 percent in value to $2.5 billion.
“We have a good product to sell and I think we’re doing a good job selling it,” said Jeff Stephan of Kodiak’s United Fishermen’s Marketing Association, after a meeting to ASMI’s international marketing committee in Anchorage in late June.
Stephan, who chairs ASMI’s international marketing committee, points to ASMI’s continuing effort to evaluate the customs, traditions, consumption behavior, eating preferences and other individual characteristics of some 17 countries in Europe and Asia, as well as Brazil, in South America, to tailor ASMI programs to meet the needs of these countries.
To that end, ASMI employs overseas marketing representatives in several countries, plus websites packed with information on everything from a seafood suppliers directory to recipes and a detailed explanation of its sustainability certification program, now administered by Ireland-based Global Trust. While Alaska’s constitution mandates sustainability in fisheries, ASMI is aware that many involved in the seafood industry need to be educated on the extensive criteria for getting certified through Global Trust. ASMI representatives are also meeting one-on-one with European buyers to explain the program.
Other big challenges Alaska seafood exports are facing in 2012 are the falling value of the Euro in Europe, which makes Alaska seafood more expensive, and a huge influx of low-priced Chilean farmed salmon into world markets. “It will be a big challenge for us,” said Ray Ruitta, executive director of ASMI.
Meanwhile, ASMI’s industry and trade website, at www.alaskaseafood.org, and the more consumer oriented www.wildalaskaflavor.com, are getting thousands of hits, and ASMI has developed templates for retailers to put some of this information onto their own websites, said Tyson Fick, ASMI’s communications director. Not to mention some 26,000 fans on Facebook. ASMI is also looking into mobile platforms to make its online resources more easily available to people using smartphones and tablets, Flick said.
ASMI is trying to build on last year’s effort, which saw seafood exports jump 35 percent in value to $2.5 billion.
“We have a good product to sell and I think we’re doing a good job selling it,” said Jeff Stephan of Kodiak’s United Fishermen’s Marketing Association, after a meeting to ASMI’s international marketing committee in Anchorage in late June.
Stephan, who chairs ASMI’s international marketing committee, points to ASMI’s continuing effort to evaluate the customs, traditions, consumption behavior, eating preferences and other individual characteristics of some 17 countries in Europe and Asia, as well as Brazil, in South America, to tailor ASMI programs to meet the needs of these countries.
To that end, ASMI employs overseas marketing representatives in several countries, plus websites packed with information on everything from a seafood suppliers directory to recipes and a detailed explanation of its sustainability certification program, now administered by Ireland-based Global Trust. While Alaska’s constitution mandates sustainability in fisheries, ASMI is aware that many involved in the seafood industry need to be educated on the extensive criteria for getting certified through Global Trust. ASMI representatives are also meeting one-on-one with European buyers to explain the program.
Other big challenges Alaska seafood exports are facing in 2012 are the falling value of the Euro in Europe, which makes Alaska seafood more expensive, and a huge influx of low-priced Chilean farmed salmon into world markets. “It will be a big challenge for us,” said Ray Ruitta, executive director of ASMI.
Meanwhile, ASMI’s industry and trade website, at www.alaskaseafood.org, and the more consumer oriented www.wildalaskaflavor.com, are getting thousands of hits, and ASMI has developed templates for retailers to put some of this information onto their own websites, said Tyson Fick, ASMI’s communications director. Not to mention some 26,000 fans on Facebook. ASMI is also looking into mobile platforms to make its online resources more easily available to people using smartphones and tablets, Flick said.
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