Courtesy of Ed Page

At 1000 feet, the M/V Shin Onoe is longer than three football fields laid end to end.

Right now, the supersized, Panama-flagged cargo ship is operating with reduced engine power in the Bering Sea.

As KUCB’s Lauren Rosenthal reports, Unalaska is gearing up to offer the vessel safe harbor.

Carl E. Moses Boat Harbor/Credit: Lauren Rosenthal

It’s been just over a year since the Carl E. Moses small boat harbor opened, and it’s hard to find anyone who’s not thrilled with the facility. But the city is still trying to figure out how to turn that enthusiasm into long-term commitments.

The city has permanent commitments for only about half of the harbor's 56 slips. Other vessels tie up as 'transients' and only pay rent when they’re in port.

Ports Director Peggy McLaughlin says that in the long run, she would like to see more of money coming from moorage, as opposed to utilities and other fees.

A Coast Guard Jayhawk MH-60 helicopter medevaced a 23-year-old fisherman from crab grounds 60 miles southwest of St. Paul yesterday. The man was working on the crab vessel North Sea when he started to feel ill.

Petty Officer Third Class Jonathan Klingenberg says that by the time the crew radioed for help at 2 pm, the man took a turn for the worse.

"At first, he was reportedly suffering from seasick-like symptoms," Klingenberg says. "Then, he started having seizures."

Courtesy of McDonald's Facebook

This week, McDonald’s doubled down on its commitment to Alaskan pollock. The chain announced that it will stop using other fish and switch to 100 percent Alaskan pollock in all 14,000 of its United States restaurants. 

The pollock is served in Filet 'o' Fish sandwiches, and in a new menu item called Fish McBites.

McDonald’s also unveiled new packaging for those products, featuring the Marine Stewardship Council’s ecolabel. The label says McDonald’s fish is verified as sustainable, "wild-caught Alaskan Pollock."

More than thirty people packed into the conference room at the Unalaska Public Library Thursday night to weigh in on a proposed trawl ban in Unalaska Bay.

Although the fate of the proposal will ultimately be decided by the state Board of Fisheries, the Unalaska Fish and Game advisory committee was tasked with adding their two cents at the meeting.

The committee ultimately voted 5-2 in favor of supporting the ban, but not before considerable public testimony and discussion.

The Unalaska Fish and Game advisory committee will address a proposed ban on trawl fishing in Unalaska Bay at their meeting Thursday night. The controversial proposal comes from the Unalaska Native Fishermen’s Association or UNFA. President Vince Tutiakoff says the proposed ban is in response to several issues, starting with an observed decline in the abundance of other species in the bay, like salmon, halibut and crab.

“And we have seven or eight small boats that fish the bays and they have gear issues out here. Several of them have lost gear due to trawling. And, you know, replacement of gear for a small boat pretty much takes their season away.”

Courtesy of Alaska Marine Science Symposium

This week, field researchers are gathered in downtown Anchorage to talk about the changes they’ve seen in Alaskan coastal waters, with a particular focus on the Arctic -- including the Aleutian Islands and Bering Sea.

KUCB’s Lauren Rosenthal is at the event and has this preview.

The Bering Sea’s largest fishery got underway on Sunday with the opening of pollock A season. 

The quota is slightly up from last year, at 1.266 million metric tons. Roughly 40 percent of that is slated to be caught during A season, which runs until June. Despite the smaller volume, the winter fishery tends to be more lucrative because the pollock are carrying valuable roe, but Unisea fleet support supervisor Guy Collins says prices could be down this year for both fish and roe becuase of larger quotas in both the US and Russia.

The Unalaska Bay tanner crab fishery opened Wednesday at noon for the first time in several years. Six boats are registered for the fishery. Fish and Game biologist Britta Baechler says that’s five more than last year, when the tanner crab fishery was in Makushin Bay, on the other side of the island.

“Typically when there’s a fishery in Unalaska Bay, the participation increases because you’re not required to have the recirculating seawater that keeps the crab alive when you’re further away from the plants that you’re going to deliver at.”