Saving Seafood

Shark finning, endangered species found in high seas boardings

August 11, 2026 — Enforcement officers have finished their deployment with Operation North Pacific Guard, the annual multinational patrol that polices illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing in international waters of the North Pacific.

Officers from NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement patrolled more than 8,000 nautical miles aboard the Canadian Coast Guard ship Sir Wilfrid Laurier, sailing with fishery officers from Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO), the Canadian Coast Guard, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the U.S. Coast Guard and the Fisheries Agency of Japan. Working under authorities granted by international law, the crew conducted dozens of boardings and inspections of foreign fishing vessels and documented violations of conservation and management measures including shark finning, possession of endangered species and failure to accurately report catch, according to NOAA.

Suspected violations were referred confidentially to the flag states of the vessels involved and to the relevant regional fisheries management organizations for investigation. Under RFMO procedures, flag states handle the investigations and any penalties; sanctions can be reviewed by the RFMOs and, for the most serious cases, can include a complete ban on fishing.

“The dedication of our officers ensures that sustainable fishing practices are upheld on a global scale,” said Benjamin Cheeseman, assistant director of NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement, Alaska Division. “Their work on the high seas directly protects the integrity of the oceans and the livelihoods of honest fishermen back home.”

NOAA did not release a violation count. DFO, which led the shipboard patrol, said in its own Aug. 6 announcement that the integrated crew aboard the Sir Wilfrid Laurier monitored several hundred fishing vessels, conducted 30 high-seas inspections and interacted with more than 500 crew members over roughly two months, turning up 52 potential violations. Those included shark finning and the use of prohibited gear to take sharks, misreporting of catch, bycatch and discards — including prohibited species — and multiple failures to use seabird protection measures while setting gear.

Read the full article at the National Fisherman

MASSACHUSETTS: Navy says it can’t help recover wreckage of Gloucester fishing boat Lily Jean

August 6, 2026  — In a letter to Gov. Maura Healey, the US Navy said it will not be able to help with the recovery of data and remains from the wreckage of the Gloucester-based fishing vessel Lily Jean, which sank off the coast of Cape Ann in January, with seven people aboard.

“We are deeply sympathetic toward the families affected by this tragedy,” read the letter dated July 27, which was received by the governor Wednesday. “However, the U.S. Navy is unable to fulfill your request for salvage and recovery.”

The response comes months after Gov. Healey wrote to the US Navy asking for assistance in investigating.

According to the Boston Globe, Healey wrote to the Navy in May that the boat had a hard drive and video recorder that the manufacturer believes might have information if recovered.

The US Navy, in its letter from Acting United States Secretary of the Navy Hung Cao, said that it remains in contact with the U.S. Coast Guard, which is leading the investigation into the sinking, alongside the National Transportation Safety Board.

The letter said, “It is our understanding both the USCG and the NTSB have the requisite information to conclude the investigation.” It is unclear if the two organizations found any evidence of what caused the sinking.

Read the full article at Boston.com

Fishing Vessel Joins Trained Team to Free Injured Humpback Whale 20 Miles off Oregon Coast

August 4, 2026 — An Oregon team joined by experts from Washington and a local fisherman freed a severely entangled humpback whale about 20 miles off the Oregon Coast on July 26. While the team removed all of the gear from the whale, the entanglement left the young whale’s jaw permanently open, leaving it unable to feed and unlikely to survive.

Oregon State University research assistant Craig Hayslip spotted the whale from a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter surveying the coast for whales and fishing gear three days earlier. He reported the whale anchored by heavy fishing gear to NOAA’s West Coast Entanglement Hotline, which activates trained responders across the region.

Responders asked local fisherman Poggy Lapham to join the effort and help lift the gear with the hydraulic winch on his boat, F/V Michele Ann. That gave responders access to free the whale from the gear. An online photo catalog identified the whale as a young humpback previously sighted in British Columbia in 2024.

The fishing vessel recovered a tangle of more than 3,000 feet of line, five sablefish pots, and individual commercial Dungeness crab traps from Oregon and Washington. Responders and the fishermen worked together to analyze the gear and evaluate the entanglement. The condition of the gear indicated that it could be derelict or lost gear. NOAA Fisheries is following up with gear owners for more details.

Lapham said the entanglement should be a wake-up call for the fishing industry to ask, “How can we better incentivize gear retrieval and tracking of lost gear to reduce this risk?”

“This is truly a heartbreaker because of the whale’s injuries, but we will learn so much from this case that can help us prevent future entanglements,” said Lauren Saez, who helped coordinate the response for NOAA Fisheries’ West Coast Region. “We disentangled the whale safely, got all the gear back, and had great collaboration with the fishing industry. Additionally, we got whale DNA samples from the gear to help identify which population it belongs to. All this information is crucial to understand what happened and what we can do to help prevent future entanglements.”

Read the full article at NOAA Fisheries

Trump administration took funding dedicated to fighting IUU fishing and used it for the World Cup

July 31, 2026 — The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump took funding set aside for combatting illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing and spent it on other priorities, including the 2026 FIFA World Cup, according to a report from Washington D.C.-focused news outlet Punchbowl News.

The outlet reported that the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) diverted most of the USD 170 million (EUR 147 million) set aside in the One Big Beautiful Bill for the U.S. Coast Guard to spend on maritime domain awareness, which would support the government’s anti-IUU fishing enforcement efforts.

Read the full article at SeafoodSource

MASSACHUSETTS: ‘Call from God’: New Bedford man recounts saving overboard fisherman

July 23, 2026 — A fisherman spent hours stranded in the water after falling overboard, until a New Bedford fishing crew rushed to his aid.

Joao Dasilva told 12 News that it was a normal day for him and the rest of the crew on the Seel Jr. as they were nearing the end of a nine-day trip.

They heard a call for help about a man overboard and didn’t hesitate to step in.

“So, we haul back … and once we got there, Sammy’s like, ‘go out on the bow and see if you can see anything,’” Dasilva recalled.

Read the full article at WPRI

Fellow fishermen, Coast Guard rescue overboard crewmember

July 20, 2026 — A commercial fisherman was rescued Saturday after falling overboard from a fishing vessel east of Truro, Mass., following a coordinated search by the U.S. Coast Guard and nearby fishing vessels.

According to the U.S. Coast Guard, Sector Southeastern New England received a report at 12:52 p.m. on July 18 that a crewmember had fallen overboard from the fishing vessel Western Edge. The vessel reported the crew member missing approximately seven nautical miles east of Truro and immediately turned around to retrace its route while searching for the missing fisherman.

The Coast Guard issued an Urgent Marine Information Broadcast (UMIB) and launched a 47-foot motor lifeboat from Coast Guard Station Provincetown along with an MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter from Coast Guard Air Station Cape Cod. The Coast Guard Cutter Melvin Bell, which was already on patrol nearby, was diverted to assist in the search.

At 2:47 p.m., the crew of the fishing vessel Seel Jr. reported spotting the missing crewmember in the designated search area.

Read the full article at National Fisherman

Humpback whale disentangled off coast of Massachusetts

June 16, 2026 — The Center for Coastal Studies disentangled a humpback whale Sunday afternoon off the coast of Massachusetts.

The young whale was anchored in fishing gear in the Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary and was freed by the center’s Marine Animal Entanglement Response team.

While the whale sustained some injuries from the entanglement, the team feels reasonably confident that it will recover, according to a release from the Center for Coastal Studies.

Late Sunday morning, recreational boaters reported a relatively small whale struggling in the buoy line of fishing gear.

The boaters reported the sighting to the U.S. Coast Guard, who contacted the NOAA Fisheries and the Center for Coastal Studies hotlines.

The Massachusetts Environmental Police were on patrol nearby and volunteered to stand by the whale while the response team attempted the disentanglement during a very short window of calm seas. TowBoatUS overheard the report and offered to stand by.

Read the full article at The Inquirer and Mirror

MASSACHUSETTS: Healey asks Navy’s help in recovering video that could show sunken fishing ship’s last moments

May 14, 2026 — Massachusetts officials are asking for the U.S. Navy’s help in recovering a piece of equipment from the fishing vessel that sunk off the coast of Gloucester earlier this year, believing the video it contains could shed light on what caused the ship to go down.

Seven people, including the ship’s captain and crew and a fisheries observer for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, died when the Lily Jean sank on Jan. 30 without sending any distress or mayday call beforehand.

Gov. Maura Healey and state Senate Minority Leader Bruce Tarr, a Gloucester Republican, wrote Monday to U.S. Navy Secretary Hung Cao, requesting help “to uncover all facts related to this incident and bring closure to the families of the F/V Lily Jean while improving safety for those who chose to carry on this beloved tradition in the future.”

“Massachusetts has a long, proud history of seafaring thanks to generations of men and women who risk their lives fishing off our coast and in the North Atlantic,” Healey and Tarr said in their letter.

Healey and Tarr said officials in the Massachusetts State Police received information suggesting that a video recorder and hard drive on the ship remain intact, and that the company that installed the equipment believes the video is retrievable.

Read the full article at WGBH

NEW JERSEY: Missing New Jersey oysterman found in Delaware Bay

April 27, 2026 — The body of a New Jersey oysterman who fell off a boat in Delaware Bay earlier this month has been recovered, according to authorities.

The Coast Guard received a Mayday call from the fishing boat the Bon Secour on April 9 about the missing oysterman, Matthew Oliver, 47, and began the first of 10 searches, covering 77 square nautical miles. Oliver was reported missing shortly after noon. The boat was near Gandy’s Beach, five miles southeast of Newport, New Jersey.

Read the full article at National Fisherman