(Top) Members from Air Station Kodiak pose for a group photo after cleaning up and maintaining a plane crash memorial site on a hillside off Anton Larsen Bay road, June 19, 2015. The plane crash took the lives of three Coast Guardsmen and a civilian pilot, June 30, 1995. Later, Guardsmen make their way toward the memorial site to pay …

Coming up this week, salmon fishermen have their nets in the waters on the Nushagak, but in Southeast the summer chinook troll season is in doubt, and we meet the new voice of the Bristol Bay Fisheries Report. All that, and Haines fishermen don’t care if you paint dolphins on it, they just want a bigger harbor. We had help …

  Coming up this week, fishermen all across Bristol Bay are gearing up for what is appearing to be a big run, a Valdez cannery has agreed to a small fine for discharge violations, and some relief for small-boat fishermen when it comes to carrying observers – maybe in three years. We had help from KCHU’s Marcia Lynn in Valdez, …

Alexandra Gutierrez/APRN Lawmakers collected nearly $200,000 in per Diem over the course of two special sessions, according to a preliminary tally by the Legislature’s accounting office. Per Diem is meant to cover food and lodging expenses, and it is federally set. It was paid at a rate of $233 per day in Juneau and $295 in Anchorage. While any legislator …

Coming up this week, fishermen from all sides of the issue went to Sitka angry but hopeful about halibut bycatch reductions in the Bering Sea and they left angry and disappointed; and, I wonder if anyone will write poetry about Astoria’s mechanical killer whale that sank before it was able to scare sea lions on the harbor floats? All coming …

Kodiak Senator Gary has been in the Alaska Legislature for over a decade and has never seen a financial morass such as the one that faces Alaska today. In this Talk of the Rock interview he expresses his optimism that the House and the Senate will agree on a budget that will avoid a shutdown of state government at the …

  NOAA leaders gathered Monday, June 8, 2015, to salute the crews of the research vessels Fairweather and Rainier (below) before they depart from Kodiak for the Arctic. From left to right, Dr. Russell Callender, acting assistant administration, NOAA National Ocean Service; Vice Admiral Michael Devany, deputy under secretary for operations; NOAA Commander Edward Van Den Ameele, commanding officer of …

Rachel Waldholz/KCAW The North Pacific Fishery Management Council voted Sunday evening to lower caps on halibut bycatch in the Bering Sea — by 21-percent overall.  But Bering Sea halibut fishermen say the cut isn’t big enough to save their communities.  The vote came after impassioned public testimony stretching over three days. Halibut biomass has declined over the past decade, and …

Rachel Waldholz/KCAW  The Advisory Panel to the North Pacific Fishery Management Council has come out in favor of reducing halibut bycatch in the Bering Sea.  The panel is made up of fishing industry representatives, and it was tasked with making a formal recommendation on the issue, by far the most contentious of the Sitka meeting happening now.  After a day …

Coming up this week, it’s an interesting time to be in Sitka, as the North Pacific Council gets set to vote on Bering Sea halibut bycatch reductions; meanwhile, the state of Alaska is fixin’ to shut down if the legislature can’t agree on a budget – we’ll find out what that means for Fish and Game and our commercial fisheries; …