The federal government is suing the owners of the Pacific Paradise for at least $1.66 million in an effort to recover costs associated with removing the fishing vessel from the reef off Waikiki where it ran aground in October 2017. … Continued
Michael Tosatto, administrator of the Pacific Islands Regional Office (PIRO) of the National Marine Fisheries Service, says his office requires holders of longline permits “to list the business and to declare (under penalty of perjury) that the information is true. … Continued
Last March, Gov. David Ige submitted to the National Marine Fisheries Service a list of nominees for upcoming at-large vacancies on the Western Pacific Fishery Management Council (Wespac). “All the nominees have knowledge of or experience in the conservation and … Continued
One of the terms and conditions in the shallow-set fishery BiOp requires NMFS to conduct a workshop with fishermen, observers, relevant experts and NMFS’ Protected Resources Division staff to “determine whether there are more effective methods for removing more fishing … Continued
How does the middle of the Pacific Ocean, an area that’s practically a desert when it comes to the nutrients that lie at the very heart of the marine food chain, manage to support some of the largest life forms … Continued
Nearly nine years ago, responding to a petition from the Center for Biological Diversity, the National Marine Fisheries Service determined that the insular population of false killer whales around the Main Hawaiian Islands constituted a distinct population segment and merited … Continued
Talk about splurging. Last June, Western Pacific Fishery Management Council members trumpeted a new Main Hawaiian Islands bottomfish stock assessment that allowed them to recommend to the National Marine Fisheries Service a 60 percent increase in the annual catch limit … Continued
What the National Marine Fisheries Service had proposed was simply unacceptable to Roger Dang, whose family’s longline vessels make up a significant portion of the Hawai‘i swordfish fleet. He likened it to the NBA limiting LeBron James to just two … Continued
Can the 1,424 adult leatherback sea turtles that ply the western Pacific withstand the losses resulting from their interactions with gear set by the Hawai‘i-based longline fishing vessels that target swordfish? A new “internal and deliberative” draft biological opinion (BiOp) … Continued
Another Whale Death: For the second time this year, a Hawai‘i deep-set longline vessel killed a false killer whale while fishing for bigeye tuna. The first incident occurred in January within the 200-mile exclusive economic zone around the state and … Continued