March 21, 2016 — The Fishing Partnership Support Services has developed a new manual to help fishermen prepare for potential crises on the water and to serve as a blueprint for communities dealing with fishing tragedies.
The manual, which the fishing advocacy organization assembled with help from researchers from Harvard University’s School of Public Health and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, will be unveiled Thursday afternoon at an event scheduled at the U.S. Coast Guard’s Station Gloucester.
“It’s something that we’ve been working on for a while,” said J.J. Bartlett, executive director of the Fishing Partnership Support Services. “The fishing communities, such as Gloucester, have developed incredible networks of support for people performing these most dangerous jobs and we wanted to come up with a standard operating procedure manual that everyone involved can use.”
Bartlett said the five-chapter manual will be available via free download from the Fishing Partnership Support Services website, as well as by hand-outs.