Local fisherman celebrates Bristol Bay protection

U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), environmentalists and a Blaine Harbor fisherman celebrated the announcement of mining protections placed January 31 on Alaska’s Bristol Bay, which has one of the largest salmon runs in the world. 

The U.S. EPA approved permanent Clean Water Act protections on Bristol Bay, blocking Pebble Mine’s 12-year-long project proposal brought by Northern Dynasty Minerals. Pebble Mine threatened irreparable damage to the watershed, as it would have extracted gold, copper and molybdenum located in the headwaters of the Kvichak and Nushagak rivers, two of the eight major rivers that feed Bristol Bay.

In 2011, Cantwell called on the EPA to block the Pebble Mine proposal if the agency found that the development would harm Bristol Bay salmon, which she called “economic lynchpins” for commercial fishermen in Alaska and Washington, according to a January 31 press release. The EPA reported in 2020 that more than 191 miles of streams and 4,614 acres of wetlands would be impacted during construction of the Pebble Mine, with 185 miles and 3,841 acres of wetlands permanently damaged or destroyed.

Cantwell spoke on the Senate floor January 31 after the EPA announced its restriction of development in the watershed.

“No company will ever be able to stick a mine on top of some of the best salmon habitat in the world,” Cantwell said in her floor speech. “Salmon fishermen from Alaska and from my home state of Washington will continue to earn their livelihoods from Bristol Bay salmon as they have for generations.”

Blaine Harbor fisherman Kevin Haines, who has fished in Bristol Bay for almost every summer since 1996, said fishers have been fighting the mine since it was proposed. 

“It’s always been a threat. It wouldn’t have affected me in my lifetime, but for the up-and-comers and future generations it would have ruined it,” Haines said on the phone, talking from Newport, Oregon, where he was docked while crabbing on the Washington coast. “We [fishermen] wouldn’t have survived.”

Bristol Bay is one of the most productive salmon runs in the world, according to a press release from Cantwell’s office, with 40 to 60 million salmon returning to the watershed every year. The salmon generate an annual value of at least $500 million for Washington state commercial and recreational fisheries and support over 5,000 fishery jobs in the state and 14,000 jobs globally.

Haines said the season for him in Bristol Bay is six weeks of nonstop fishing, starting in the beginning of June and ending the first week of August. He began as a deckhand in 1996. He first captained a boat in the bay in 2000, and, except for 2020 due to the pandemic, he said he hasn’t missed a summer. Last year’s season was one of the largest he’s seen, he said, with over 77 million salmon caught. It made for his second biggest catch in over 20 years – his biggest catch was 297,000 pounds, he said.

 “If you are in love with fishing, its exhilarating,” Haines said. “If you are there for the money, it’s just a chore.”

Haines said his favorite part about fishing in Bristol Bay is setting the net when nobody is around and watching the net start to dance with the flopping of the salmon.

Haines said he has turned the Bristol Bay season into a family business over the years. His son Dylan Haines and daughter Julia Moquin have joined him for multiple summers in Alaska.

Cantwell said the EPA’s action will protect similar family legacies. She called it the final nail in the coffin for Pebble Mine, saying the mine would have devastated Bristol Bay salmon and the livelihoods of thousands of hardworking families.

“The EPA’s decision to permanently protect Bristol Bay is the culmination of a hard fought battle, and I am proud to have stood with fishing families, communities, Tribes and the whole Pacific Northwest region to oppose the Pebble Mine for more than a decade,” Cantwell said in the statement. “Now, we will have a thriving Bristol Bay salmon run for generations to come.”