July 8, 2024 — An electrical fire has damaged one of three spiral freezers aboard Northline Seafoods’ new floating fish processor Hannah, which is anchored in Bristol Bay’s Nushagak district this salmon season.
The vessel is currently operating at a reduced capacity after Sunday’s blaze, and other processors are taking on some of Northline’s fleet.
During a recent visit to the Hannah, a steady stream of frozen, whole fish emerged from a large spiral freezer. Each fish landing on a conveyor belt was whisked away to the next stage in the production line.
These frozen fish were some of the first sockeye salmon deliveries of the season from Bristol Bay fishing vessels to the Hannah, Northline’s brand-new floating freezer barge in the region.
From there they made their way to grading belts, where they were sorted by size and then placed into cold storage for processing later in the year.
“So it goes through a spiral freezer, where it goes in the bottom, exits out the top, gets graded, and that goes into a box,” said Northline CEO Ben Blakey.
Blakey said it just takes a few hours for the spiral freezers to bring the fish down to their desired core temperatures. The idea is that freezing fish at these ultra-low temperatures — and freezing quickly — makes a big difference in maintaining quality.