Issue: January 2023

After 17,000 nautical miles and 124 days at sea, the crew members of the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Healy came back to its homeport in Seattle, the agency announced Nov. 11. The crew’s journey was considered a historic one as the 420-foot medium icebreaker traveled in high Arctic latitudes and reached the geographic North Pole Sept 30, “only the second time a U.S. surface vessel had reached 90 degrees north unaccompanied,” the USCG said.  The crew also provided law enforcement presence in the Arctic and the Gulf of Alaska. “It is more important than ever before to provide security and sovereign presence in the Arctic and expand oceanographic research to understand the impacts of environmental change,” said Healy’s commanding officer, Capt. Kenneth Boda. “The crew of Healy is proud to hav...

In late October, the U.S. Coast Guard completed cleanup efforts after the 70-foot fishing vessel Bill Ketner partially sank at a pier in the San Pedro area of Los Angeles. At about 7 p.m. on Oct. 24, the Coast Guard Sector Los Angeles-Long Beach Incident Management Division received notification that the f/v Bill Ketner had partially sunk at the pier with a max capacity of 2,500 gallons of diesel onboard. Working alongside Los Angeles Port Police and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s Office of Spill Prevention and Response, Coast Guard pollution responders oversaw the successful clean-up operation, the Guard said. The vessel was lifted and stabilized using eight flotation air bags. Once the vessel was raised to the surface of the water, the hull was patched and fuel rem...

There’s still no end in sight for the years’ long dispute over whether to connect shorter links between the all-weather airport at Cold Bay, Alaska, to the Aleutian fishing community of King Cove, through a one-lane gravel road passing through Izembeck National Wildlife Refuge. A decision handed down in mid-November by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a decision reached earlier in 2022 by another three-judge panel that approved of a land swap between the federal government and the King Cove Corp., an Alaska Native village corporation, under the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA). A panel including more than two dozen attorneys with the Ninth Circuit Court was to review briefs from the case to determine whether a fair decision was reached. Residents of Ki...

Federal officials have approved a plan for demolition of four aging dams on the Klamath River at the foot of the Cascade Mountains in an effort to open up salmon habitat and restore the river by 2024. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) unanimous decision allows for the $500 million demolition project, which would return the river to a free-flowing state for the first time in over a century. Removal of the dam could begin as early as the summer of 2023. On Nov. 17, FERC unanimously approved a request from PacifiCorp to surrender licenses and decommission the Lower Klamath Project’s four hydroelectric dams on the Oregon and California border, ending decades of debate over the issue. Oregon Senators Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden said in a joint statement that they viewed FERC’s...

A new report from the federal Government Accountability Office (GAO) says that to date the U.S. Coast Guard has implemented just five of 22 key statutory requirements for improved vessel safety in the established strategic goals and performance goals for its commercial fishing vessel safety program. The GAO report, released in early November, noted Coast Guard efforts to conduct dockside exams, engage with industry and collaborate with the National Marine Fisheries Service and other federal agencies. The Coast Guard also issued two-year safety decals to all vessels that successfully completed the dockside exams, the report said. However, the Coast Guard has only partially or not implemented 17 other requirements, according to the GAO, including one to develop alternate safety standards f...