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35–915 PDF 2007

COMMERCIAL FISHING VESSEL SAFETY

(110–33)

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON 

COAST GUARD AND MARITIME TRANSPORTATION

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

TRANSPORTATION AND 

INFRASTRUCTURE 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

APRIL 25, 2007

Printed for the use of the 

Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure

(

COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE 

JAMES L. OBERSTAR, Minnesota, Chairman 

NICK J. RAHALL, II, West Virginia 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

JERRY F. COSTELLO, Illinois 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

JERROLD NADLER, New York 

CORRINE BROWN, Florida 

BOB FILNER, California 

EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas 

GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi 

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland 

ELLEN O. TAUSCHER, California 

LEONARD L. BOSWELL, Iowa 

TIM HOLDEN, Pennsylvania 

BRIAN BAIRD, Washington 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts 

JULIA CARSON, Indiana 

TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York 

MICHAEL H. MICHAUD, Maine 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri 

JOHN T. SALAZAR, Colorado 

GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California 

DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois 

DORIS O. MATSUI, California 

NICK LAMPSON, Texas 

ZACHARY T. SPACE, Ohio 

MAZIE K. HIRONO, Hawaii 

BRUCE L. BRALEY, Iowa 

JASON ALTMIRE, Pennsylvania 

TIMOTHY J. WALZ, Minnesota 

HEATH SHULER, North Carolina 

MICHAEL A. ACURI, New York 

HARRY E. MITCHELL, Arizona 

CHRISTOPHER P. CARNEY, Pennsylvania 

JOHN J. HALL, New York 

STEVE KAGEN, Wisconsin 

STEVE COHEN, Tennessee 

JERRY MCNERNEY, California 

VACANCY 

JOHN L. MICA, Florida 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

THOMAS E. PETRI, Wisconsin 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee 

WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland 

VERNON J. EHLERS, Michigan 

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio 

RICHARD H. BAKER, Louisiana 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

JERRY MORAN, Kansas 

GARY G. MILLER, California 

ROBIN HAYES, North Carolina 

HENRY E. BROWN, JR., South Carolina 

TIMOTHY V. JOHNSON, Illinois 

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania 

SAM GRAVES, Missouri 

BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania 

JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas 

SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia 

JIM GERLACH, Pennsylvania 

MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida 

CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania 

TED POE, Texas 

DAVID G. REICHERT, Washington 

CONNIE MACK, Florida 

JOHN R. ‘RANDY’ KUHL, JR., New York 

LYNN A WESTMORELAND, Georgia 

CHARLES W. BOUSTANY, JR., Louisiana 

JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio 

CANDICE S. MILLER, Michigan 

THELMA D. DRAKE, Virginia 

MARY FALLIN, Oklahoma 

VERN BUCHANAN, Florida 

(II)

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COAST GUARD AND MARITIME TRANSPORTATION 

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland, Chairman 

GENE TAYLOR, Mississippi 

RICK LARSEN, Washington 

CORRINE BROWN, Florida 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

BRIAN BAIRD, Washington 

TIMOTHY H. BISHOP, New York 

VACANCY 

JAMES L. OBERSTAR, Minnesota 

(Ex Officio) 

STEVEN C. LATOURETTE, Ohio 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

HOWARD COBLE, North Carolina 

WAYNE T. GILCHREST, Maryland 

FRANK A. LOBIONDO, New Jersey 

TED POE, Texas 

JOHN L. MICA, Florida 

(Ex Officio) 

(III)

(V)

CONTENTS Page

Summary of Subject Matter .................................................................................... vii 

TESTIMONY 

Backus, Ann, Director of Outreach, Department of Environmental Health, 

Harvard School Of Public Health ....................................................................... 24

Baines, Robert, Fisherman and Chairman, Maine Commercial Fishing Safety 

Council .................................................................................................................. 24

Bone, Rear Admiral Craig, United States Coast Guard, Assistant Commandant for Prevention ....................................................................................... 3

Collins, Captain Blaine E., Vice President and Regional Manager N/S America, Det Norske Veritas ........................................................................................ 24

Dzugan, Jerry, Chairman, Commercial Fishing Industry Vessel Safety Advisory Committee, Executive Director, Alaska Marine Safety Education Association .................................................................................................................... 3

Frank, Hon. Barney, a Representative from the State of Massachusetts ........... 9

Hughes, Leslie, Executive Director, North Pacific Fishing Owners Association, 

Former Member of Commercial Fishing Industry Vessel Safety Advisory 

Committee ............................................................................................................. 24

Lincoln, Jennifer M. Ph.D., Injury Epidemiologist, Commercial Fishing Research Project Officer, CDC/NIOSH/Alaska Field Station ............................... 3

Shrader, Deb, Shore Support, Inc., New Bedford, Massachusetts ...................... 24

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS 

Bishop, Hon. Timothy H., of New York ................................................................. 42

Cummings, Hon. Elijah E., of Maryland ............................................................... 43

Frank, Hon. Barney, of Massachusetts .................................................................. 46

Larsen, Hon. Rick, of Washington .......................................................................... 49

PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED BY WITNESSES 

Backus, Ann ............................................................................................................. 50

Baines, Robert S. ..................................................................................................... 65

Bone, Rear Admiral Craig ....................................................................................... 69

Collins, Blaine E. ..................................................................................................... 77

Dzugan, Jerry ........................................................................................................... 87

Hughes, Leslie J. ..................................................................................................... 91

Licoln, Jennifer Ph.D. .............................................................................................. 95

Shrader, Debra M. ................................................................................................... 109

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD 

Bone, Rear Admiral Craig, United States Coast Guard, Assistant Commandant for Prevention, response to question from Rep. LaTourette ............. 17

Lincoln, Jennifer M. PhD, Injury Epidemiologist, Commercial Fishing Research Project Officer, CDC/NIOSH/Alaska Field Station, chart of 

commerical fishing industry fatality rate by fishery, Alaska, 2000-2006, 

as requested by Rep. Larsen ............................................................................... 21

ADDITIONS TO THE RECORD 

H E Candage, Inc., Howard E. Candage, President, written testimony ............. 112

Northeast Maritime Institute, Eric R. Dawichi, President & CEO, written 

statement .............................................................................................................. 120

National Research Council, Marine Board Study Report, Fishing Vessel Safety: Blueprint for a National Program, submitted by Alan R. Dujenski ........... 130

Page

VI

United States Marine Safety Association, Burt W. Thompson, Executive Director, written statement ..................................................................................... 139

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35915.005
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35915.006
(1)

HEARING ON COMMERCIAL FISHING VESSEL 

SAFETY 

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON COAST GUARD AND MARITIME

TRANSPORTATION, 

Washington, DC. 

The Subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:00 a.m., in Room 

2167, Rayburn House Office Building, the Honorable Elijah E. 

Cummings [Chairman of the Subcommittee] presiding. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. This hearing will come to order. 

Today, the Subcommittee on the Coast Guard and Maritime 

Transportation convenes a hearing to examine fishing vessel safety 

in the United States. Commercial fishing is, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the most hazardous occupation in the 

Country, so it is important that the Subcommittee examine the role 

the Federal Government should play in enhancing safety for those 

who spend their lives at sea harvesting fish and seafood for both 

the American and world markets. 

Tragically, fatal injuries among fishermen and women increased 

50 percent during the period from 2002 to 2005, while fatal injuries 

among all U.S. workers increased by only 3 percent during that 

same period. 

The fatal occupational injury rate was 140 fatalities per 100,000 

fishers, more than 28 times the average rate for all industries. Further, according to a recent Coast Guard analysis, an average of 127 

fishing boats were lost and 58 fishers were killed each year during 

the period of 1994 to 2004. 

Fishermen and women have been an important part of the American economy since the first settlers landed on the shores of Virginia and Massachusetts, and commercial fishing still sustains 

thousands of families and contributes billions of dollars to our economy. 

But when commercial fishing turns deadly—and, tragically, it 

often does—families are torn apart by the loss of husbands, wives, 

sons, and daughters. Six years ago, 15 families experienced such 

terrible losses when the fishing vessel ‘‘Arctic Rose’’ sank in the 

Bering Sea in what was the worst fishing vessel casualty since 

1951. 

For years, Congress required that fishing vessels be equipped 

with life jackets, but little else, which is a bit like asking airline 

passengers to make sure to pack their parachutes before boarding, 

2

but not requiring seat belts or emergency exits or fire suppression 

systems on the planes. 

In 1988, Congress passed the Commercial Fishing Industry Vessel Safety Act, which required that commercial fishing vessels 

carry more modern life saving equipment. Today, however, there 

are still no design construction maintenance or operating standards 

for commercial fishing vessels. 

Therefore, we will hear the testimony of witnesses who will share 

with us their experiences under the existing statutes and, most importantly, help point us in the directions that can prevent casualties from occurring on fishing vessels and hopefully enable crews 

on fishing vessels to respond quickly and appropriately to onboard 

emergencies and maximize lives saved in the event an accident 

does occur. 

It is my hope that the Subcommittee will gain a greater appreciation of this most hazardous occupation and will identify specific 

actions that can be taken to protect the lives of those who make 

a living from the sea. 

I also want to thank Congressman Barney Frank for his leadership on this issue that is of critical concern to his district. Congressman Frank will join us shortly, after convening a hearing in 

the Financial Services Committee, and we look forward to hearing 

from him. 

Mr. LaTourette. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Mr. 

Chairman, most of the attention focused on the Coast Guard in the 

last few years has been on the service’s responsibility to provide for 

the service and security of the maritime transportation sector. 

However, the Coast Guard’s traditional missions like maritime 

safety are still equally important, and I want to commend you, 

Chairman Cummings, for convening this hearing today. 

Just as a side note, with the convening of this hearing today, I 

have now officially spent more time with you than I have with my 

wife over the last two weeks, so I thank you for that. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Unlike virtually all other commercial vessels 

in the United States, fishing vessels are not required to be inspected by the Coast Guard. Legislation was passed in 2004 to 

bring towing vessels, the other significant remaining classes of 

uninspected vehicles, under a Coast Guard inspection regime. Regulations to carry out that provision are currently being drafted. 

A separate authority and regulatory regime exists to assure the 

safety of recreational fishing vessels that are found in the Great 

Lakes, where I hale from, and, therefore, I don’t believe this hearing will look into those vessels. 

The rate of death in the fishing industry remains significantly 

higher than in other industrial occupations. I look forward to hearing discussions from the witnesses today about whether this higher 

death rate could be significantly reduced by increased attention to 

the condition of the vessels and safety equipment, in other words, 

items subject to inspect, or whether the higher death rate is due 

to weather conditions, the remote locations, or the work and the 

dangers inherent in the process of fishing. 

3

I am also curious to hear whether there are ways in which fishery managers can improve industry safety by crafting fishery management plans that allow fishermen flexibility on when they can 

fish. 

Again, Chairman Cummings, I want to thank you for holding 

this hearing today, and I look forward very much to the testimony 

of our witnesses. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. LaTourette. 

We will call our first panel: Rear Admiral Craig Bone, Dr. Jennifer Lincoln, and Jerry Dzugan. 

Rear Admiral Craig Bone, Assistant Commandant for Prevention, of the Coast Guard. Welcome. We will hear from you first. 

TESTIMONY OF REAR ADMIRAL CRAIG BONE, USCG, ASSISTANT COMMANDANT FOR PREVENTION; JENNIFER M. LINCOLN, PHD, INJURY EPIDEMIOLOGIST, COMMERCIAL FISHING RESEARCH PROJECT OFFICER, CDC/NIOSH/ALASKA 

FIELD STATION; JERRY DZUGAN, CHAIRMAN, COMMERCIAL 

FISHING INDUSTRY VESSEL SAFETY ADVISORY COMMITTEE, 

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, ALASKA MARINE SAFETY EDUCATION ASSOCIATION 

Admiral BONE. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and distinguished 

Members of the Subcommittee. I am Rear Admiral Craig Bone, Assistant Commandant for Prevention, United States Coast Guard. I 

am pleased to have this opportunity to appear before you today to 

discuss the Coast Guard’s Commercial Fishing Vessel Safety Program and its initiatives. 

Before I begin, I would like to take a moment, on behalf of the 

Commandant, to express our sincere condolences on the loss of 

your Committee Member, Representative Millender-McDonald. 

The Coast Guard’s Commercial Fishing Vessel Safety Program is 

aimed at improving safety in the commercial fishing industry, reducing the number of vessels lost, and reducing the loss of lives. 

The thrust of the existing Commercial Fishing Vessel Safety Program is to gain compliance with the commercial fishing regulations 

through educational, voluntary, no-fault, dockside safety exams and 

through other outreach efforts. Regulatory enforcement is accomplished through at-sea boardings which complement the Commercial Fishing Vessel Safety Program. We must balance our prevention efforts with our response capabilities to minimize the consequences of casualties when they do occur. 

Commercial fishing is historically one of the most hazardous occupations, if not the most hazardous occupation, in the United 

States. In 2005, the Bureau of Labor Statistics found that commercial fishermen and workers aboard uninspected fishing vessels died 

at a rate of 118 per 100,000 workers. For comparison, the fatality 

rate for the towing industry, another uninspected segment of the 

marine industry, was only 17 per 100,000 workers, while the American workplace as a whole, as stated by the Chairman, was only 

4 deaths per 100,000 workers. 

Commercial fishing vessel safety has long been a matter of concern of the Coast Guard, but limitations on regulating the safety 

of commercial fishing vessels have been encountered because they 

are classified as uninspected vessels. From the 1930s to the 1980s, 

4

there were various legislative proposals to increase safety standards for commercial fishing vessels, such as requirements for periodic safety inspections, watertight compartments, and licensing of 

vessel operators. None of those proposals came to fruition. 

In 1971, the Coast Guard completed a study and cost-benefit 

analysis of alternative safety programs for commercial fishing vessels. The report documented the fishing industry’s poor safety 

record and concluded that one of the primary causes was that fishing vessels, with few exceptions, have traditionally been exempted 

from safety regulations required of other commercial vessels. 

The study recommended licensing of masters, mandatory safety 

standards including full inspection and certification of new vessels, 

and mandatory and voluntary standards combined with inspection 

and certification of existing vessels. The report also compared fishing vessels with small passenger vessels, noting the 80 percent reduction in passenger deaths after the Small Passenger Vessel Safety Act of 1956 required structural and loading standards on inspections on those vessels. 

Several fishing vessel tragedies in the early 1980s, as well as the 

fishermen’s concerns over rising insurance costs, resulted in renewed interest in fishing vessel safety. The Coast Guard formed a 

Fishing Vessel Initiative Task Force in August 1984 to study how 

fishing vessel safety could be promoted. Task Force recommendations resulted in voluntary safety standards for commercial fishing 

vessels. 

The Commercial Fishing Vessel Industry Safety Act of 1988 was 

signed into law by the president on September 9th, 1988. This Act 

gave the Coast Guard authority to prescribe safety regulations. The 

impact of the safety legislation and regulations and subsequent 

safety initiatives was seen in a reduction of our fatality averages. 

Despite market improvement in safety within the commercial 

fishing vessel industry, the Coast Guard is troubled by our inability 

to prevent vessel losses. Half of all casualties result from vessel 

losses predominantly from material failures in the hulls and the 

crew’s inability to either prevent the casualties or respond to the 

emergencies. These very issues were addressed in the requirements 

for training and competency of fishing vessel crews in 1992. 

We believe if the Coast Guard had the additional authorities requested in those recommendations, significant improvements in 

safety could result. The additional authorities of safety within the 

commercial fishing industry would be consistent with the authorities of other developed countries where standards have been put in 

place. 

In summary, Congress, the commercial fishing industry, and the 

Coast Guard have all worked to improve commercial fishing vessel 

safety, but there is still much work that can be done. We believe 

there are large gains that can be made through increased authority 

for crew competency measures, licensing requirements, and mandatory fishing examinations and inspections. We are continuously improving our posture to minimize the consequences of vessel casualties when they occur, and I am pleased to be here with the other 

professional national experts that are committed, the same as the 

Coast Guard, to protect the fishermen’s lives and prevent the loss 

of vessels. 

5

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I will answer any questions that you 

have. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Rear Admiral. 

Dr. Jennifer Lincoln, National Institute for Occupational Safety 

and Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, United 

States Department of Health and Human Services. Welcome. 

Ms. LINCOLN. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, my name is 

Dr. Jennifer Lincoln. I thank you for the opportunity to speak to 

you today. I am a U.S. public health service officer working for the 

National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. NIOSH is 

the Federal agency responsible for conducting research and making 

recommendations to identify and prevent work-related illness and 

injury. I lead our commercial fishing safety research program in 

Alaska, and I am pleased to share our work with you today regarding how safety improvements implemented in the Alaskan fishing 

fleet could benefit other regions of the United States. 

From 1990 through 2006, there was significant decline in the 

number of commercial fishing fatalities in Alaska. We know that 

this decline is not solely a function of the reduction of the workforce because we observed a 51 percent decline in the fatality rate 

among commercial fishermen. The decline in fatalities is a result 

of improvements in safety. Commercial fishermen, the industry, 

the U.S. Coast Guard, marine safety organizations, and NIOSH 

have collaborated to improve safety of the Alaskan fleet. 

I will now briefly review four areas of opportunity for improving 

fishing vessel safety: preventing vessel loss, preventing fatalities 

due to falls overboard, preventing severe injuries due to deck machinery, and establishing marine safety training for all commercial 

fishermen. First I will discuss the prevention of vessel loss. 

Fifty-four percent of all fatalities in the fishing industry are due 

to the loss of a fishing vessel. NIOSH has recommended that a 

focus be placed on the prevention of vessel loss. The U.S. Coast 

Guard responded in Alaska by implementing the Dockside Enforcement Program in 1999. The program identifies and corrects safety 

and stability hazards known to exist on vessels, participating in 

the Bering Sea and Aleutian Island crab fisheries, historically the 

most dangerous fisheries. 

NIOSH evaluated the effectiveness of the Dockside Enforcement 

Program and found that the fatalities significantly decreased after 

implementation of the program. Similar dockside programs could 

be implemented in other hazardous fisheries across the Country. 

Next, the prevention of fatalities from falls overboard. Thirty percent of all fatalities among fishermen are due to falls overboard. 

NIOSH has found that although the overall fishing fatality rate 

has decline in Alaska, the rate for fatal falls overboard has not 

changed. Tailored prevention strategies are required to prevent 

falls overboard from occurring in the first place. These prevention 

strategies should be specific to each fishing gear type and each hazard, such as an entanglement or weather. 

NIOSH has made additional recommendations to prevent drowning after a person falls overboard. We have recommended that all 

fishermen wear personnel flotation devices, or PFDs, when on the 

deck of any vessel. There are more types and styles of PFDs availVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00017 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
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able now than ever before. NIOSH is planning a field study with 

commercial fishermen to identify available PFDs having features 

that fishermen like and will use. 

Next, the prevention of severe injuries. NIOSH has found that, 

in Alaska, a fisherman was hospitalized for an injury once every 

10 days. Many of these injuries were attributed to being entangled 

or struck by gear or being trapped in deck equipment. Furthermore, efforts are required to prevent injuries on deck, including the 

redesign of machinery or the retrofitting of safety features on existing fishing equipment. 

NIOSH has worked with fishermen to identify better equipment 

design and safer work practices. We continue to identify other deck 

hazards with the intention of engineering safer designs. 

Lastly, I will discuss marine safety training. Research suggests 

that individuals involved in a disaster are more likely to respond 

appropriately to save their lives if the have had emergency training. NIOSH has found that those people who died in commercial 

fishing vessel sinkings were less likely to use survival gear and less 

likely to have had safety training when compared to survivors of 

these events. 

NIOSH has previously recommended that basic fishing safety 

training be completed before crew license or fishing permits are 

issued. 

In summary, substantial progress in improving safety has been 

made in Alaska’s most hazardous industry. The activities that have 

occurred in Alaska provide a blueprint to improve safety elsewhere 

in the United States. The written testimony we submitted contains 

many more details regarding this. 

NIOSH plans to continue to support the safety of the commercial 

fishing industry by assisting in research and evaluation of interventions across the Country to prevent vessel loss, to prevent fatalities due to falls overboard, to prevent severe injuries due to 

deck machinery, and to establish marine safety training programs 

for all commercial fishermen. 

NIOSH recognizes that our efforts are most effective through collaboration, and we look forward to continuing our partnerships 

with fishermen, the industry, the U.S. Coast Guard, and marine 

safety organizations. 

Thank you for the opportunity to testify to you today. I am 

pleased to answer any questions that you may have. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Dr. Lincoln. 

Jerry Dzugan, Executive Director, Alaska Marine Safety Education Association. Welcome. 

Mr. DZUGAN. Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and 

Members of the Subcommittee. Thank you for this opportunity to 

speak. 

I fish commercially in Alaska both as a vessel owner and a crew 

member. I have been personally involved with bringing or facilitating over 1,000 safety workshops around Alaska and other coasts 

of the U.S., in my work with the Alaska Marine Safety Education 

Association, or AMSEA. I was a member of the original Coast 

Guard Fishing Vessel Safety Advisory Committee and am now its 

chairman. Since the Commercial Fishing Safety Act of 1988 was 

implemented, there have been 306 fishing fatalities in Alaskan waVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
7

ters. Some of these fishermen I counted among my friends and 

neighbors, so fishing vessel safety is a personal, not an abstract, 

issue with me, as it is for many other fishing families. 

But there has been a real change in the safety culture in some 

parts of the Nation. Before the Act was implemented, an average 

of 43 fishermen died every year in the first five years, from the late 

1980s to the early 1990s. However, the most recent five-year average saw an average of just 10 fishermen dying every year. That is 

not to minimize that there were just 10 fishermen, but that rate 

has gone down 77 percent if you compare those two five-year periods. NIOSH has calculated that 250 deaths have been prevented in 

Alaska alone as a result of the Safety Act. 

I believe that there are several reasons for this progress in Alaska. One, there has been an effort in Alaska to enforce the regulations equally and systematically. Coast Guard personnel have been 

reasonable but firm regarding how these regulations have applied. 

In addition, alternative compliance to regulations has been negotiated with some fleets that has actually increased the overall level 

of safety, and this has been actually welcomed by the fleet. But 

regulations have not been enforced equally throughout the U.S., 

and this is the main reason why the training infrastructure, which 

started in the early 1990s, no longer exists in some regions of the 

Country. 

Secondly, studies conducted by NIOSH and others have documented again the positive effects of safety training that has had on 

survivability after a sinking. Training organizations such as 

AMSEA, North Pacific Fishing Vessel Owners Association, Sea 

Grant, and other private trainers maximize survivability in the 

event of a casualty, but also prevent casualties by raising risk 

awareness among fishermen. AMSEA’s grassroots training infrastructure would not have been possible without the support of the 

Alaska congressional delegation. But, again, this training infrastructure does not exist to this degree outside of Alaska and the 

Pacific Northwest. 

The experience gained in the last 20 years of this education effort 

will be invaluable if training is expanded. An emphasis on skills 

proficiency and competency should be a higher priority, however, 

than passing a written licensing exam and will be much better accepted by fishermen. 

Thirdly, the NIOSH field office in Anchorage started a surveillance system in the early 1990s. This office tracks fatalities and injuries and supports quality hands-on safety training. This surveillance method does not exist in the rest of the Nation. 

The two other issues the Safety Act sought to address are vessel 

inspections and licensing. Recommendations were made on vessel 

inspections and crew qualifications, but the Coast Guard was not 

given any additional authority in these two areas. 

As in the Chairman’s analogy to issuing parachutes to airline 

passengers, the Safety Act focuses on survivability after a vessel 

loss. This is a reactive, not a proactive, way toward safety and preventing casualties. It is also extremely inefficient and costs the taxpayers millions of dollars—just one search can cost over $1 million—plus, high-risk operations to helicopter crews trying to make 

rescues. 

8

The Safety Act also ‘‘requires the Secretary to compile statistics 

concerning marine casualties ... from insurers of fishing vessels.’’ 

These statistics don’t exist in a format that anyone can use to 

make recommendations from. 

Currently, there is a rulemaking working its way through the 

Coast Guard. It will attempt to make emergency drills training 

more enforceable and address stability on some fishing vessels. 

Given that a fishing vessel is lost at sea almost once every three 

days, it is hoped that this proposed rulemaking can be expedited 

in a timely manner, but with enough time for comments by industry. 

One final point. The present regulations need two basic simple 

changes to give fishermen a level playing field. One, there is no 

reason why a 36-foot State registered vessel fishing next to a 36-

foot federally registered vessel should follow a different set of regulations and be exempt from safety training, as now exists. Secondly, the so-called Boundary Line is a totally arbitrary line for 

fishing vessel safety requirements that bears no relationship to the 

risks found inside or outside its boundaries. 

Finally, fishing vessel safety has gone through a revolutionary 

process of improvement in the last 25 years, but not equally across 

the Nation. Many regions lack good statistics, equal enforcement, 

and training infrastructure. Until these discrepancies are addressed, we will continue to lose lives unnecessarily in commercial 

fishing. 

Until you feel comfortable with your son or daughter going commercial fishing, as you feel comfortable with them getting on a 

commercial airliner, we still have room for improvement in commercial fishing. 

Thank you for this opportunity to comment, and I would be 

happy to take any questions. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. 

It is my understanding that Congressman Frank will be here in 

any moment. When he does get here, we will have him provide his 

testimony, but, in the meantime, we will go forward with our questions. 

Admiral Bone, the regulations applicable to commercial fishing 

vessels have been on the books for over 15 years, and still less than 

10 percent of the fleet take advantage of the voluntary dockside 

exam program the Coast Guard adopted in 1991. Do you think this 

needs to be mandatory? 

Admiral BONE. Yes, Mr. Chairman. Our data and the testimony 

that was just given reflects that if there is a mandatory or an enforceable program in place, it does reduce the casualties. It has 

been proven over and over again. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. So are you in any way surprised by that 10 percent figure? In other words, do you see anything other than mandatory enforcement? So often, what happens around here, you know, 

folks don’t like mandatory. 

Admiral BONE. Mr. Chairman, I will just tell you 30 years in the 

Coast Guard, any program that is purely voluntary, you are going 

to have the same 10 percent that are on the high end, willing and 

coming forward to have themselves examined, inspected, and they 

are probably going to exceed the standard, quite often, than just 

9

meet it. It is the ones that need it that will try to get away from 

the standard and/or avoid it. Unfortunately, our only mechanism, 

as was stated, was to enforce it at sea and terminate someone. 

That is an ineffective response. 

I can tell you that just a voluntary program alone doesn’t result 

in statistics. I think an example where it has been successful here 

with Alaska has been an example where the State has been directly involved, other organizations and agencies have been involved, and the industries themselves have basically stepped up, 

and it is a very close-knit group. Not all of the fishing industry is 

that way around the United States. In Alaska there is a lot of centralization where there is an ability to do that, so that is a community effort. In places like Alaska and Maine we have seen some of 

that, but I don’t think that it could be accomplished nationwide, 

based on our experience. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Congressman Frank, I said that as soon as you 

arrived we would hear from you. You can come forward, please. We 

look forward to hearing your statement. We want to thank you for 

requesting this hearing. I want to thank you for your interest and 

we want to know what it is that you want us to do to help address 

the issues that you are bringing to our attention. 

TESTIMONY OF HON. BARNEY FRANK, A REPRESENTATIVE 

FROM THE STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS 

Mr. FRANK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One of the things I want 

to talk about is the VMS, the Vehicle Monitoring System, which 

helps locate people. And I apologize for the fact that I was not 

wearing one today, because, if I was, I would have been here five 

minutes ago, instead of going to a different room and getting lost. 

I am sorry for that. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. We will see if we can find you one. 

Mr. FRANK. Thank you. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. FRANK. I really appreciate your responsiveness when I spoke 

with you. Last year, when the Congress rewrote the Magnuson Act, 

which governs fishing, I was pursuing some safety concerns, but 

there were jurisdictional issues, and I am sure you are pleased to 

know that your colleagues on the Resources Committee last year 

respected the jurisdiction of this Committee and noted that some 

of the things that we were talking about were Coast Guard related 

and, therefore, they were more appropriately done here. 

There was one major pro safety thing that was put into the Magnuson Act, namely, a requirement that when they do the fishing 

regulations—the National Marine Fisheries Service does the fishing regulations—they take safety into account. But for that fully to 

be done, there needs to be—and this is one of the key points—a 

role for the Coast Guard, and I hope that one of the things that 

we will see out of this is a mandate with this Committee and the 

Resources Committee go guarantee that there is significant ongoing 

Coast Guard input into the safety issues. I hope that we will see 

the National Marine Fisheries Service and the Coast Guard mandated fully to cooperate. They do cooperate some now, but particularly when there are crises. 

10

One of the leaders on fishing issues in my District, Deb Shrader, 

will be testifying later, and I did note in reading her testimony, her 

understandable, profound expression of gratitude to the Coast 

Guard for the degree to which members of the Coast Guard risk 

their lives to try to help deal with these terrible fishing accidents. 

We have had a couple of tragedies with fishing boats lost. They are 

fairly small boats out in pretty deep water in pretty bad weather, 

and that is inevitable to some extent. The fishermen are not complaining, they have voluntarily taken on one of the most dangerous 

jobs in America, but we can do better. 

Here are some specifics that I hope you will be able to address. 

One is a matter of safety training that ought to be axiomatic. We 

can do better. We have had some good volunteer efforts in safety 

training. I represent the City of New Bedford, which, along with 

the adjacent town of Fairhaven, brings in more dollars in fish 

caught, seafood caught, than any other port; scallops, but they do 

other deep sea fishing. The safety training has been helpful and 

the City of New Bedford has put some money in; they got some 

NOAA money and they got some of their own money. But one of 

the things we can do is to fund safety. We are not talking about 

even tens of millions of dollars, but a couple million dollars put into 

safety training. 

You know, there is a question about mandatory versus voluntary. 

I guess if some people feel if you physically force someone to take 

safety training, it is probably not going to do a lot of good, but the 

fishermen are smart and they understand the dangers, and they 

are ready to do this. So fully funding a volunteer training is important. 

The second issue that I wanted to stress is the one I just mentioned, namely, that working together, the two Committees make 

sure that the Coast Guard is given full opportunity to participate 

in the entity known as the Commercial Fishing Industry Vessel 

Safety Advisory Committee. It does seem that the Coast Guard 

ought to be very much involved with that. 

We would also like to be able to expand the dockside inspection. 

Right now, the Coast Guard mandates dockside inspection for those 

fishing vessels which carry observers. We have a program that 

NMFS does whereby people go out to observe to make sure that the 

rules are being addressed. These are kind of neutral people out on 

the fishing boats. It seems a little odd. What we do is we mandate 

safety when the observers are there, but not when the observers 

aren’t there. The inference would be, I guess, that we are really 

only worried about people drowning if they are observers, not so 

much if they are fishermen, and that really is a kind of unintended 

invidious discrimination that we ought to get rid of. So it does seem 

to me that, in recognition of the importance of what the Coast 

Guard does, that the dockside inspections should be for all of the 

boats, not just those that have observers. 

Next, I mentioned the vessel monitoring system. I said vehicle 

because I am not by nature a fisherman; I have learned. You learn 

by your district. We are talking about vessels, not vehicles. These 

have a great potential. There was some resistance on the part of 

the fishermen originally because they were kind of like they told 

11

the Coast Guard where the fishermen were when they shouldn’t be. 

But we think they have a greater potential for safety. 

There needs to be a development of the technology so they can 

be used fully for safety. For example, one of the things we want 

to do is this. You are given a limited number of days when you can 

fish. You are out there fishing and the weather turns bad. A prudent captain decides to go back to port, but a couple years ago, if 

you did that, you would lose those days. The day you spent steaming back to port would be taken away from you, so that you had 

people saying, well, I will take the chance, because this is their 

livelihood. We want to make sure that if you break off a trip for 

reasons of safety or maybe because someone has developed appendicitis on the crew, that you are not charged with that as a fishing 

day. But to be able to do that, we need to be have complete monitoring of where the vessel is, and we think that you can improve 

the quality of the VMS. If you can improve the quality of the VMS 

and have total confidence in it, then you can make sure that no incentive is given for the captain to be fishing when safety says get 

out of there. 

We would also like to see a national safety research program to 

deal with people, including in academia. The University of Massachusetts branch in Dartmouth, Massachusetts, does wonderful 

work on fishing, and this is an area where our universities could 

significantly improve things. 

Two more. One, right now, fishing vessels above 79 feet in length 

have to meet stability and watertight integrity standards. In that 

sense, I suppose we are trying to emulate them. I haven’t seen, in 

the various ethics proposals, any requirement that we be stable, 

but watertight integrity does appear to be one of the obligations we 

will be undertaking. I don’t know if the Coast Guard will be inspecting Members of Congress to make sure we have watertight integrity, but we do have a question about fishing vessels below 79 

feet. Now, I understand the Coast Guard is working on proposals 

to work in that direction. We strongly urge that this be done. 

I will say I have spoken to some Members, including, for instance, our colleague from Alaska, Mr. Young, who is a man of considerable fishing experience and interest. He is more skeptical of 

the smaller boats being done. One of the things that it seems to 

me we could do, what we talked about last year, is let there be regional variations. We have regional variations in fishing, we have 

the various fishing councils. In the region I represent, a very important fishing region in the Northeast, we think it is very important to extend the inspection downward, and it may be based on 

anybody whose permit goes a certain way. But cutting it off at 79 

feet, not inspecting the boats below 79 feet doesn’t make sense. I 

know the Coast Guard is working on this, and I hope they will be 

able to resolve that. Obviously, if they needed any legislative authority, I would hope you would give it to them. They tell me they 

don’t. 

Finally, the fishing vessels now have to conduct monthly safety 

drills, but there is no requirement that those be logged. I think 

that would be very helpful, to require that they be logged. 

That is it. I appreciate your hearing later from—I don’t think she 

has arrived yet—Deb Shrader, who has been very active in fishing 

12

and is the wife of a fishing captain. This is an area obviously that 

is not ideological, it is not partisan. I think there is a universal 

commitment here. I do want to acknowledge the very good work 

the Coast Guard has done, and we say this not in criticism, but 

building on the work they have done where we think we can go further. 

I thank you for listening. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Congressman. 

Any questions, Mr. LaTourette? 

[No response.] 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Any questions of any member of Congressman 

Frank? 

[No response.] 

Mr. CUMMINGS. With that, thank you. 

Mr. FRANK. Thank you. I do notice that Deb Shrader, who has 

accommodated us by coming down here and who is a great resource 

for the fishing industry, has joined us. I did want to acknowledge 

her presence. She is a very thoughtful and intelligent source of information here, and I urge the Committee to pay very serious attention to what she says, and I thank you. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. We anxiously look forward to hearing from her. 

Thank you again. 

I want to resume my questions of you, Admiral Bone. We understand that there is a package of regulations on a variety of subjects, and I have made it clear to Admiral Allen that we are concerned about quite a few regulations. But in those are included stability for vessels of less than 79 feet; training requirements for 

emergency suits. We understand that is working its way through 

the agency, but still must clear the Department and the Office of 

Management and Budget before a notice of proposed rulemaking 

can be published. 

Some of these regulations, as you well know, have been pending 

since 1992. That is a long time. What is the situation there, can 

you tell us about that? 

Admiral BONE. Yes, sir. I can tell you, Mr. Chairman, that the 

regs, just as you said, are going through their final review. They 

will incorporate the issues that Congressman Frank mentioned, 

many of the issues that he mentioned, including the training, the 

record keeping, as well as the stability issues. We believe strongly 

that vessels between 50 and 79 feet, looking at the data and now 

over time, being able to verify that those vessels in fact are the 

ones at highest risk because they are going out into the deeper waters. Basically, they are going further offshore, and they have significant stability issues, as well as construction and maintenance 

issues that apply to it. 

I can’t make any excuses with regard to not having the regulations to you earlier other than this is an industry that we needed 

to actually develop an understanding of. As you said earlier in your 

opening statement, is it an issue of the vessel itself or is it the operating area, or is it a combination thereof? We wanted to make 

sure that, again, due diligence in this process, that we only bring 

forward regulations where they are really required. We have 

worked closely with the Commercial Fishing Vessel Industry Safety 

Committee in order to establish where those thresholds lie. Those 

13

regs, where the law allows, will be put forward to you. Obviously, 

we are still constrained by the law in order to address some of the 

other issues that we think could in fact improve the safety as well. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Well, let’s go back to that for a moment. Do you 

have any idea when we will move this? Let me tell you why I am 

saying that. I tell my kids that life is like a basketball game, with 

a clock up in the corner, and we are on the court. At some point 

the clock is going to run out, and while you are on the court, you 

better play the best game you have got. 

We have a limited amount of time to occupy these positions and 

you have a limited amount of time to occupy yours, so, before the 

clock runs out on us, I need to have an idea of when we are going 

to get this done, because I have been looking at the regulations 

that have been pending, and I have got to tell you it is not satisfactory. It just isn’t. We can do better and we need some timetables. 

Admiral BONE. Mr. Chairman, we expect the notice of proposal 

to go going forward and be presented to the public in late summer, 

early fall. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Late summer or early fall. Well, why don’t we do 

this. Why don’t we try to bring you back in September, sometime 

in September, and see where we have gotten with regard to the 

regulations? It might be a short hearing or it may be a long one. 

Admiral BONE. I understand. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. But I would love to have that because this clock 

is ticking and I want to make sure we get that done. 

The Coast Guard authorization bill that passed the House last 

year, including a provision establishing design, construction, and 

maintenance standards for the American Fisheries Act replacement 

vessels, do you believe that the establishment of such standards increases the safety of these vessels? 

Admiral BONE. Yes, sir. Again, vessels that meet at least established standards with regard to both construction and stability requirements will in fact provide for increased safety. 

Now, I just want to add one thing. It is not just building it that 

way; you have got to maintain it that way as well. And then you 

have to operate within the constraints of your stability requirements. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. I am going to ask just one more question, then 

I want to let my colleagues get their questions in. 

Dr. Lincoln, it appears that the Coast Guard’s aggressive comprehensive dockside enforcement program has been effective in reducing vessel casualties in some Alaska fisheries, specifically the 

crab fishery. Is there any reason that you are aware of that explains why the Coast Guard has not instituted the same kind of 

comprehensive dockside enforcement program in other regions of 

the Country? 

Admiral BONE. Yes, Mr. Chairman. First, one of the ways that 

this has been extremely helpful is that——

Mr. CUMMINGS. I had asked Dr. Lincoln. 

Admiral BONE. Oh, I am sorry. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. But, since you are so anxious and excited, we 

wouldn’t want to deny you this opportunity. You are pumped up. 

Must have been that clock ticking, huh? 

[Laughter.] 

14

Admiral BONE. I apologize, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. That is all right. Go ahead. 

Admiral BONE. My only observation in particular for the Coast 

Guard, since it was how the Coast Guard has been effective in 

there, I think the issue is, again, the State has basically put in 

place a mandate that before they get underway in that particular 

fishery, for their fishing permit—I will be corrected, Doctor—is 

they have this examination conducted, which in fact makes it mandatory, versus voluntary, in order to get their fishing permit. So 

that is one of the major factors, in addition to the efforts by my 

colleagues to my left in actually engaging in the training program 

and providing professionals to do it. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Doctor, another question to that one, are there 

any other measures that should be taken to prevent vessel loss? 

Ms. LINCOLN. Now, that is a big question. Regarding the preseason activities that the Coast Guard implemented in Dutch Harbor prior to the Bering Sea and the Aleutian Island crab fisheries, 

when that was started, it was October of 1999, and this was an initiative that the Coast Guard started there and was not a requirement of the State at that time. NIOSH had shown that the Bering 

Sea crab fleet had the highest fatality rate of any fleet in the State, 

and the Coast Guard accompanied the State biologists when they 

were doing their crab check, the tanks, to see if the tanks were full. 

To see if the tanks were empty, actually. When they boarded the 

vessels, they would ask the skippers to see their stability information and issue a captain-of-the-port order if the vessels were either 

loaded incorrectly or if their survival equipment was not well maintained or present. 

To answer the question of whether or not—I can’t remember if 

it was whether or not other fisheries should be involved or if——

Mr. CUMMINGS. Other measures that should be taken to prevent 

vessel loss. 

Ms. LINCOLN. To prevent vessel loss, NIOSH has recommended 

previously that more stability requirements be explored, and certainly I think that expanding the preseason enforcement programs 

of other identified fisheries that have high fatality rates, to check 

their safety and stability prior to them going to sea, also would be 

helpful. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. LaTourette. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you all for your testimony. 

Just to follow up on the Chairman’s last question getting into 

structural matters and design, either Admiral or Dr. Lincoln or Mr. 

Dzugan, would requirement of load lines on fishing vessels assist 

in this endeavor? 

Admiral BONE. A load line alone won’t solve the problem. I think 

the issue is people just being aware of the stability and the load 

that they are actually placing on their vessel. Sitting on a vessel, 

if the vessel is large enough, a load line is helpful. But, again, you 

have got to understand the basic stability issues and the sea state 

that you are in and your loaded condition—that can vary over 

time—as well as these vessels that operate in the north, how quickly they can ice up and take preventive measures to get out of that 

region or to understand when they are in harm’s way and they 

15

need to take corrective action. The problem predominantly is these 

vessels are almost instantaneously rolling over because they 

haven’t done anything leading up to it and they don’t really understand the design of their vessels, and then they also haven’t practiced what to do in the event of these situations if they become 

aware of them. That is what the real issue is here, having the capacity and capability to intervene and having satisfactory interventions. The load line, again, is helpful, but on smaller vessels—we 

are talking about some of these vessels that are 50 feet, not real 

large vessels, so a load line in and by itself is not that significant. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. I think Chairman Frank always makes excellent points, and of his excellent points in his remarks I think this 

whole notion of the tension between the number of days you are 

permitted to fish versus safety. That should really never be a consideration, I think. I assume you would echo, that his notion if 

somebody has to abort a fishing trip because it is not safe, that 

that shouldn’t be counted against their time at sea. 

Admiral BONE. Congressman, if I had it my way, it would never 

count against their time at sea. Safety of the crew, safety of the 

environment—you know, some of these vessels are fairly large and 

spill oil, etc., in the environment. But safety has to be the paramount issue here. 

I can tell you that the National Marine Fisheries Service has 

made adjustments to what were derby days, so to speak, and extended periods of time in various fisheries that have had a market 

improvement in people making those determinations. The Coast 

Guard is working with the fishing councils to basically look to improve those same opportunities, and where we are engaged is just 

on that issue of safety and trying to make sure that safety is put 

forward as paramount. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Mr. Dzugan? 

Mr. DZUGAN. If I may, would it be so easy as to make a simple 

black and white determination about what is a safe sea condition. 

A safe sea condition for a 36 foot vessel and a 79 foot vessel are 

quite different. So, realistically, it is kind of a hard thing to implement. 

I just wanted to make that comment. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Okay. I appreciate that. 

Admiral, my last question has to do with some regulations that 

have already been put into place. Pursuant to 46 U.S.C. 4502 and 

4503, certain fishing vessels that have entered into operation and 

were substantially altered after September the 15th, 1991 were required to have additional safety requirements and stability requirements. Does the Coast Guard keep statistics of what percentage of 

the U.S. fishing fleet now falls into that post-September 15th, 1991 

category? 

Admiral BONE. I am not aware of any specific statistics. I am not 

sure that we boarded the 80,000 vessels or all the vessels that are 

applicable to that. What we will do is we will look and see what 

is available and provide an answer for the record, sir, if that is acceptable. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Sure it is, and I appreciate that. In my opening statement I mentioned the 2004 changes that the Coast Guard 

is now working on regulations for towing vessels, and just ask if 

16

you have some information on how the loss rates compare between 

fishing vessels, towing vessels, and those commercial vessels that 

are currently inspected. 

Admiral BONE. We will provide that as well, sir. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Thank you. 

[Information follows:]

17


35915.007
18

Mr. LATOURETTE. Thank you, Chairman. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. LaTourette. 

Mr. Taylor. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I want to thank our participants. 

Admiral, when you work up these recommendations, the only 

thing that I would ask is that the Coast Guard clearly distinguish 

in these requirements the difference between double digit waves off 

of Alaska in the middle of the winter and the bath-like water of 

the Coast of Louisiana and Mississippi during the summer, and the 

requirements that you are going to have for almost certain death 

if you are in the water for a few minutes in Alaska in the winter 

versus literally days to be recovered in the Gulf. My fear is if the 

Coast Guard overreacts, puts too many requirements on the industry, that what you will see is the sort of shift we saw in Congress 

in 1994, where it went from too many regulations to a period of 12 

years where there were almost none. I would sure hate to see that 

happen. I do think there were some problems that you and Dr. Lincoln have pointed out that need to be addressed, but I know the 

response to too much regulation, and that is a period of backsliding 

where there is none. So I would just hope you would take those factors into account. 

Admiral BONE. We will, Congressman. 

Mr. TAYLOR. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. LoBiondo. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Once again, a very 

good hearing. 

Appreciate the participation of our panelists today. 

For those of you who may not know or realize, I represent New 

Jersey’s 2nd Congressional District, which includes Cape May, New 

Jersey, which is the second largest fishing port by value of landings 

on the East Coast and the fifth largest nationwide. On the East 

Coast, only Congressman Frank’s district, New Bedford, outranks 

us. 

The industry employs thousands of fishermen who risk their 

lives to provide for their families, and I wholeheartedly agree that 

we should be taking steps to improve the crew safety and strongly 

encourage the Coast Guard to work with the industry to do just 

that. 

I just have a couple of questions on the crew survivability pilot 

program that is included in the legislative program for fiscal year 

2008. That is, according to Coast Guard statistics, I believe something like 146 fishermen have lost their lives in District 17 from 

1994 to 2004, I think by far the largest number of fatalities than 

anywhere else in the Country. 

Since this is the case, Admiral, can you explain or talk to us 

about why you are proposing to implement this program in Coast 

Guard Districts 1 and 8, ignoring District 17, where I think, according to your statistics, most of the fatalities are occurring? 

Admiral BONE. Yes, Congressman. As you said, it is a pilot program. The reason it is targeted at the areas that I will call the 

Northeast and the Gulf is our statistics, as we are looking at them, 

actually the trend in Alaska is significantly downward, to the point 

of very few casualties, actually, and loss of lives in that arena. The 

19

1st District, as well as the 8th District, however, are either stable 

or increasing. The Northeast Region is actually increasing; in fact, 

I think we have had seven deaths just this year in the region. So 

we know that that is an area, one, where we have limited and, as 

you said, it is a very broad fishing community, and we believe that 

without a mandatory program being in place in those regions, and 

because of how spread out and diverse they are, versus having a 

collective way to address them, that they will be most effective in 

those particular regions where they are needed. 

Again, this is a pilot program. It has got a sunset clause that is 

put forward in it. It is not a permanent program. But we intend 

to also prove whether or not what we have experienced in the 17th 

and in the State of Maine, where they have a similar type program 

as Alaska—not exactly, but similar—where we can be effective, and 

that is why we have chosen those areas. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Well, I certainly hope it is successful, and I hope 

you are talking to the industry. One of the concerns is that while 

the Coast Guard is extremely well intentioned, as was discussed by 

some of the panel earlier about the limited number of fishing days 

available, if the Coast Guard comes in 48, 72 hours before the time 

that the vessel is to go out and then, you know, they have to stay 

tied up at dock while they are missing fishing days. If they have 

got enough notice, I think the industry certainly wants to cooperate, but I really hope that we can make sure that we are understanding the realities of life for these folks. 

Admiral BONE. Yes, sir. And we re also working closely with the 

Commercial Fishing Vessel Industry Safety Advisory Committee as 

we go forward and develop those standards. 

Mr. LOBIONDO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you. 

Mr. Larsen. 

Mr. LARSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you this hearing 

and an opportunity to ask some questions. Coming from Washington State’s 2nd District, we have got a few small towns with 

fishermen memorials with names on them, so it is clearly an important topic for people in my district, but also important too because Northwest Washington is the base for a lot of the North Pacific fishing fleet as well, between Seattle, north into Alaska. There 

are a few folks who make a living from commercial fishing in the 

North Pacific, so it is a pretty important hearing for folks back 

home as well. 

So I have a few questions, first for Dr. Lincoln. Your report covers commercial fishing vessel safety looks like to be in the aggregate, as opposed to breaking it out by industry. Is that right or not? 

By fishery as opposed to all fisheries. 

Ms. LINCOLN. Well, we have looked at all fisheries in Alaska, but 

I think, in order so that we are not trying to make a one-size-fitsall approach for fishermen in the Gulf of Mexico versus Bering Sea 

crab fishermen, it is important to look at hazards specific to fisheries. 

Mr. LARSEN. This gets to my next question, then. Does your data 

indicate a different level of hazard by fishery in the North Pacific? 

Ms. LINCOLN. Yes. 

Mr. LARSEN. It does. 

20

Ms. LINCOLN. Yes, it does. 

Mr. LARSEN. So can you give me a rating based on a standard 

of the per 100,000? 

Ms. LINCOLN. Certainly. Depending on which fishery we are looking at, in 1997 we published a report breaking it down by shellfish 

versus salmon versus herring, if I can find these numbers——

Mr. LARSEN. We will take that for the record. 

Ms. LINCOLN. Okay. 

Mr. LARSEN. That would be great. 

Ms. LINCOLN. I would be happy to provide the most recent information that we have. 

Mr. LARSEN. Could you do that? 

Ms. LINCOLN. Yes. 

Mr. LARSEN. We would appreciate that. So we will take that for 

the record.[Information follows:]

21


35915.008
22

Mr. LARSEN. Mr. Dzugan, with regards to this question about different fisheries and so on, how many fisheries have you fished in 

in your life? 

Mr. DZUGAN. Two. 

Mr. LARSEN. Which ones? 

Mr. DZUGAN. Halibut long-lining and salmon trolling. 

Mr. LARSEN. Okay. Representative Frank, earlier in his testimony, indicated his conversation with Mr. Young regarding the less 

than 79 foot regulation, the 50 foot to 79 foot regulation, and 

whether or not there is a full applicability to apply to stability 

rules. I think that is what he said. So there might be some need 

for variation. Do you have a thought on that? 

Mr. DZUGAN. From the stability courses I have done, including 

the National Cargo Bureau’s course, and working with larger ships, 

the rule is the smaller the vessel, the tighter the stability constraints become. So, as a general rule, if you are talking about vessels under 79 feet, it is more difficult to achieve the same stability 

standards. 

Mr. LARSEN. And why is that? 

Mr. DZUGAN. Less free board is one big thing. Basically, you have 

got the same kind of fishing operation crammed into a smaller and 

smaller space, so you have perhaps smaller freeing ports onboard. 

Mr. LARSEN. Let me ask you this. Would you have a variation 

in size of ship in any one fishery, say the crab fishery or the halibut? Would you have a variety of sizes involved? 

Mr. DZUGAN. Yes. 

Mr. LARSEN. Doing the same activity? 

Mr. DZUGAN. Absolutely. 

Mr. LARSEN. As opposed to the catcher boats who are supplying 

larger processing ships or onshore processing facilities? 

Mr. DZUGAN. In some fisheries you would have a big difference 

between the size of the vessel. In other fisheries they would be 

more consistent in size. 

Mr. LARSEN. More consistent in size. 

Mr. DZUGAN. So it depends on the fishery. 

Mr. LARSEN. So it does depend on the fishery. 

Admiral Bone, do you have a thought along this line of questioning? 

Admiral BONE. Yes, I do. I think the issue is actually is the vessel built with stability in mind. And then when you get a stability 

letter, it gives you the constraints on how you load that vessel. 

Mr. LARSEN. Right. 

Admiral BONE. Then you have to basically adhere to that. But 

we have got to be careful that——

Mr. LARSEN. And this is the issue that all of the popular books 

written about capsized crab boats have been written about, this 

very issue, how you load these. 

Admiral BONE. Yes, sir. Where you place the weight and how you 

move the weight. What I want to offer, though, is too much attention is placed on just the length. The reason why we are looking 

at those is because of the casualty data. That is reactive. The reality is if we get ourselves into this length criteria too closely, we 

have already seen vessels that are 36 foot long and then they make 

themselves 36 foot wide just so they can be under the regulation 

23

and not have to meet different standards, or make themselves almost round so that they can carry more in the same area in order 

to avoid certain regulations. So we are working very closely with, 

again, the fishing advisory council, to make sure that, as we approach this, we approach it in a sound way. We are working with 

the industry leaders as well so that we don’t have this reaction to 

it. Again, we are targeting based on historical data. 

Mr. LARSEN. Right. 

Admiral BONE. If everybody started making their ships different 

ways and we had stability problems with them, we would be pursuing it even to a lower level, and we don’t want to encourage that. 

Mr. LARSEN. Right. Good. Good. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Just a few more questions. 

Dr. Lincoln, the testimony with regard to safety training and the 

effect of that training, it is interesting that it has a significant effect, from what you all have seen, is that right? Why do you think 

that is? 

Ms. LINCOLN. Because people are trained to react to an emergency. Survival experts have documented that people who have 

training and know what to do will react in a manner to save their 

lives. So it is the effect of hands-on training that is available to 

Alaskan fishermen that actually puts them in survival suits, puts 

them in life rafts, enables them to I guess develop the muscle memory of knowing and being able to effectively save their lives and 

abandon their ship when they need to. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Mr. Dzugan, in your written testimony you commented on this extensively. The natural inclination is to try to save 

yourself. A lot of people don’t know how to save themselves, so this 

gives them a way to carry out that which would be a natural selfsurvival kind of way. Is that a fair statement, Mr. Dzugan? 

Mr. DZUGAN. Thanks for asking me that. It is a subject really 

close to my heart. People tend to react in an emergency the way 

they are trained, and if they haven’t been trained in how to react 

to an emergency, most people, according to statistics, about 75 percent of them become the dumb sheep; they don’t know what to do. 

In the Oklahoma City bombing, one person was found under a desk 

putting on their makeup because that is what you do. Somebody 

else was sorting their desk because that is what you do when you 

leave the office. 

So I believe the survival training does two things: like Dr. Lincoln said, it gives people that automatic reaction of: this is what 

I do in a sinking; I grab my suit or the life raft; I am not overwhelmed with choices here, I have only got two of them. The second thing the training does that is very important is it makes 

somebody realize that this could happen to them. Right now, in 

this building, we are on the first floor. I think I can find my way 

out. But if we were to go on a second or third floor, if I were just 

to come to this hearing room and not had thought about how I 

would exit here, in an emergency I probably wouldn’t know which 

way to go. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. You know, when they had this unfortunate incident happen in Virginia, the shooting incident—I am sure you may 

have seen this—they said one young man was pretty much bleedVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00035 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
24

ing to death, but he had the wherewithal to take the shirt or something and tie it around his leg or wherever he was bleeding, and 

he basically saved his own life. I guess that is the same kind of 

concept you are talking about. 

Mr. DZUGAN. Yes, exactly. And I would bet that he had seen a 

lot of that on TV. He learned that from someplace, he didn’t just 

create that on the spot. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. That leads me to my last question. Maybe it is 

a whole different kind of phenomena going on here, but should 

training in such things as seamanship, stability, collision prevention, navigation, firefighting, damage control, personal survival, 

emergency medical care, and weather be required for operators of 

commercial fishing vessels that operate more than three nautical 

miles from shore? 

Mr. DZUGAN. Yes. I think you could make a very good argument 

from statistics and from studying NTSB and Coast Guard reports 

and doing interviews with survivors that anyone who goes to sea 

should have some minimal amount of survival training and should 

be able to demonstrate proficiency in that. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Dr. Lincoln, what is your opinion on that? 

Ms. LINCOLN. NIOSH has found that people who have had survival training are more likely to survive a vessel sinking. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. All right, any other questions? 

[No response.] 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you all very much. This has been extremely helpful. We may be following up with a few questions in 

writing. Thanks again. 

Would our next panel come forward? Ann Backus, Robert Baines, 

Leslie Hughes, Captain Blaine Collins, and Deb Shrader. 

Thank all of you for being with us this morning. We will first 

hear from Director Ann Backus, Director of Outreach, Department 

of Environmental Health, Harvard School of Public Health. Thank 

you for being with us. 

TESTIMONY OF ANN BACKUS, DIRECTOR OF OUTREACH, DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH, HARVARD 

SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH; ROBERT BAINES, FISHERMAN 

AND CHAIRMAN, MAINE COMMERCIAL FISHING SAFETY 

COUNCIL; LESLIE HUGHES, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, NORTH 

PACIFIC FISHING OWNERS ASSOCIATION, FORMER MEMBER 

OF COMMERCIAL FISHING INDUSTRY VESSEL SAFETY ADVISORY COMMITTEE; CAPTAIN BLAINE E. COLLINS, VICE 

PRESIDENT AND REGIONAL MANAGER N/S AMERICA, DET 

NORSKE VERITAS; AND DEB SHRADER, SHORE SUPPORT, 

INC., NEW BEDFORD, MASSACHUSETTS 

Ms. BACKUS. Thank you. Good morning, Chairman Cummings, 

Ranking Member Mr. LaTourette, distinguished Members of the 

Committee. Thank you for your interest in this important topic and 

for this opportunity to provide testimony on commercial fishing 

safety. My name is Ann Backus. I am instructor of occupational 

safety and Director of Outreach for the Harvard-NIOSH Education 

and Research Center at the Harvard School of Public Health. I 

serve on the Maine Commercial Fishing Safety Council. 

25

Memorial monuments to fishermen along the East Coast attest 

to the hazards of fishing. They speak not only of the individual 

fishermen, but of the families and the communities of fishermen 

deeply affected by those lost at sea. Statistics also tell us of the 

hazards. In 2004, the fatality rate for fishermen was 20 times that 

of the United States national fatality rate for all workers. During 

the nearly 20 years since the passage of the Commercial Fishing 

Industry Vessel Safety Act of 1988, there has been a reduction in 

fishing fatalities. But we have more work to do to make fishing 

safer, to save lives, and to save vessels. 

I would like to speak to two of the many concerns associated with 

commercial fishing: first, the need for regulatory parity between 

federally documented fishing vessels and State numbered vessels; 

second, the need for training and certification of competency in various fisheries. 

First, parity. Fishermen on State numbered vessels are at greater risk than those on federally documented vessels when fishing beyond the Boundary Line. Whereas, federally documented vessels 

fishing beyond the Boundary Line are required to have basic equipment such as anchors and VHF radios, State numbered vessels do 

not. Whereas, documented vessels are required to have a variety of 

safeguards, including bilge alarms, bilge systems, a high water 

alarm for vessels over 36 feet, and monthly safety drills, State 

numbered vessels are not. 

Without these requirements, the crews of the State numbered 

vessels are at greater risks in all types of emergencies: flooding, 

medical, capsize, man overboard, fire, etc. They will probably not 

have donned immersion suits, set off flares, or practiced abandoning ship. Moreover, their capacity for self rescue is limited; they 

rely on the Coast Guard for their rescue and survival. The risk to 

both the fishing crew and the Coast Guard could be reduced if the 

requirements for State numbered vessels matched those of documented vessels fishing right beside them. 

Recently, the Maine Commercial Fishing Safety Council under 

Chairman Bob Baines designed a fishing safety matrix based on 

the Fishing Safety Vessel Act and a consensus of what constitutes 

best practice. Initially, we replaced the Boundary Line with three 

zones, working seaward from the three mile line. Currently, our 

discussions are centered around using only the three mile line, 

which, when coupled with removing the distinction between documented and numbered vessels, simplifies the regulations dramatically and increases safety. 

Secondly, training and competency. When I participated with the 

Coast Guard and the Maine Marine Patrol in the harbor visits and 

dockside exam in South Hartwell last June, we helped an elderly 

fisherman and his wife into their Harpswell immersion suits and 

into the water for the first time in their long fishing careers. On 

the same day, another fisherman told me he realized he should 

have completed the dockside exam years ago. These responses are 

typical. Clearly, dockside exams and training and practice are 

needed. 

The Maine Commercial Fishing Safety Council has stepped up 

safety training. As of February 1, 2007, all fishermen in the lobster 

apprentice program must complete the U.S. Coast Guard-approved 

26

drill conductor course. This is an industry-driven initiative that 

lays the groundwork for a culture of safety in Maine. 

The public health perspective emphasizes prevention. We need to 

make prevention a priority in the fishing industry and educate 

fishermen to take steps early to arrest the cascade of events that 

lead to injury and loss. The occupational safety perspective focuses 

on the work environment, work practices, and human factors. Fishery-specific education and training can address these concerns. 

Maine mandated a fishery-specific course for urchin divers in 1994 

after eight divers died in the prior five years. There have been no 

diving deaths since 1994. 

Training and regulation need to go hand-in-hand. Training provides, in large part, the incentive for regulatory compliance and instills a prevention mind-set. 

Going forward, there may be a role for State legislation to support fishing safety, and certainly there is a role for industry-driven 

initiatives such as the Maine Commercial Fishing Safety Council. 

Partnerships and collaborations with the Coast Guard should be 

fostered because the safety of the fleet and the vitality of the industry depend on our ability to work together. 

Thank you for your attention. I would be pleased to respond to 

your questions. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. 

Robert Baines, who is a fisherman and Chairman of the Maine 

Commercial Fishing Safety Council. Thank you for being with us. 

Mr. BAINES. Congressman Cummings, distinguished Members of 

the Committee, I would like to thank you for the opportunity to 

speak with you today on a subject that I live with as a regular 

course of doing my job. My name is Bob Baines, and I am a lobster 

fisherman from mid coast Maine. I am Chairman of Maine’s Commercial Fishing Safety Council, a board member of the Maine 

Lobstermen’s Association, and president of the Spruce Head Fishermen’s Co-op. 

I have commercially fished my entire adult life, owning and operating my own boats for over 25 years. I am primarily an inshore 

lobsterman, but I have extensive history as a scallop fisherman, as 

well as experience working on groundfish boats throughout the 

Gulf of Maine. 

As we all know, commercial fishing is a dangerous occupation 

that threatens fishermen’s lives and property on a daily basis. As 

a fisherman, I have personal knowledge of the danger and subsequent consequences of operating a fishing vessel and the inherent 

risks challenging Mother Nature. 

I had the unfortunate experience of participating in a search and 

rescue for two local teenage boys. These aspiring young fishermen, 

lacking in experience, were in a boat that was inadequate for the 

weather conditions. Their boat capsized and both drowned in cold 

April waters. We found one of the boys washed ashore on an island 

and I found the other boy the next day still in the water. I will 

never forget that unnecessary tragedy. 

I realize that not all risk can be removed from commercial fishing, but there are some things that can still be done that would increase the safety of commercial fishermen without burdensome and 

expensive regulations. 

27

Maine’s Commercial Fishing Safety Council recently recommended and spearheaded the implementation of safety training 

as a component of Maine’s lobster apprentice program. Beginning 

in January of this year, all fishermen enrolled in the apprentice 

program, over 1,000, are required to complete the U.S. Coast 

Guard-approved drill conductor course before they can get a commercial lobster license. If the two young boys I mentioned earlier 

had participated in safety training, their lack of judgment and dire 

consequences might have been different. Commercial fishing safety 

training by all commercial fishermen is a goal of Maine’s Commercial Fishing Safety Council, and I encourage this Committee to help 

make that goal a reality. 

As Maine’s near-shore fishing fleet, which numbers in the thousands, has grown and upgraded, the issue of parity between State 

registered vessels and federally documented vessels is a concern. It 

makes no sense to have two sets of rules, one for State registered 

boats and a second for federally documented boats. If a vessel is 

required to have specific safety equipment, then common sense 

would tell you that all vessels of the same size and operating the 

same distance from shore should require the same safety equipment. Current Federal law prohibits States from enacting commercial fishing safety requirements. The danger is the same whether 

you are State registered or documented. 

When the Commercial Fishing Industry Vessel Safety Act of 

1988 was passed, the Maine Lobstermen’s Association was opposed 

to any kind of safety requirements for State registered boats. Times 

have changed and the Maine Lobstermen’s Association and other 

industry organizations recognize that the Commercial Fishing Safety Act of 1988 has saved lives and further recognizes the importance of safety regulations for all commercial fishermen. 

Federal preemption prohibits States from enacting and enforcing 

fishing vessel safety regulations. Why shouldn’t States have the 

ability to protect their citizens as the Federal Government does? 

States should be given the option and authority to enforce safety 

regulations in State and Federal waters. Sensible and easily understood safety regulations would promote compliance. 

Maine wants to adopt commercial fishing safety regulations. 

Maine’s fishing industry supports this objective. 

The second issue I would like to bring to your attention today is 

the Boundary Line. The Boundary Line is an arbitrary line that 

has no rationale in determining risk to commercial fishermen. The 

Boundary Line does not appear on charts, and its inconsistency 

should disqualify it from any logical use in fishing vessel safety 

regulations. 

The three mile line exists on all charts; it is consistent. Distance 

from shore is a true measure of risk that makes sense. The substitution of the three mile line for the Boundary Line would go a long 

way toward making Federal fishing safety regulations more practical and user-friendly. 

Thirdly, there has been of late a surge of interest and support 

for safety training in the commercial fishing industry throughout 

the Country. Fishermen are recognizing the advantage that safety 

training provides them. Safety training provides fishermen with 

28

the necessary tools to handle difficult situations with emergency response skills. 

Current Federal regulation requires all federally permitted vessels to have on board a person who has successfully passed the drill 

conductor course and conduct drills on a monthly basis, or have a 

qualified drill conductor perform monthly drills dockside. 

This regulation is very difficult to enforce. Maine’s Commercial 

Fishing Safety Council would like to propose a simple method to 

enhance safety: require all fishermen holding National Marine 

Fisheries Service Commercial Vessel Operator’s Permits to successfully complete the Drill Conductors Course. The captain of the vessel is responsible for the safety of his or her crew. The captain 

should be required to complete this course. This suggestion is easily enforceable; possession of an Operator’s Permit proves completion of the course. The structure for issuing the Operator’s Permit 

is already in place, as is the Coast Guard-approved Drill Conductors Course. 

Parity, preemption, the Boundary, and training. These issues 

need to be dealt with at the Federal level to enhance safety for all 

commercial fishermen. 

I would like to thank the Committee for your time and attention. 

I would be happy to answer any of your questions. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. 

Ms. Hughes? 

Ms. HUGHES. Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee. I thank you for the opportunity to testify today on fishing vessel safety. It is a subject 

that I have been very involved in for 22 years. 

My oral statement will be brief, but I request that my full written statement be entered in the record. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Without objection, so ordered. 

Ms. HUGHES. Thank you. 

I am the Executive Director of the North Pacific Fishing Vessel 

Owners’ Association, known as NPFVOA, Vessel Safety Program. It 

is a non-profit organization totally dedicated to safety, training, 

and education of commercial fishermen. Our facility is located in 

Seattle. In the Seattle area, vessels are significant; they represent 

a very diverse fleet and they account for about 85 percent of the 

catch in Alaska, which equates to approximately 50 percent of the 

Nation’s seafood harvest. 

I have worked in the fishing industry for 32 years, 22 of which 

have been with the NPFVOA since its inception. I served 9 years 

on the Coast Guard’s Fishing Vessel Safety Advisory Committee 

and I was recently reappointed to a 3-year term. 

The NPFVOA Vessel Safety Program was developed in 1985 in 

cooperation with the U.S. Coast Guard as a voluntary effort to improve the poor safety record of the commercial fishing industry in 

the North Pacific. The reason, as you heard from Admiral Bone, 

was that the Coast Guard was unable to get regulations in place 

at that time. 

I would like to just describe briefly a few of the key concepts on 

which our program has been built that could possibly provide lessons for the future, safety, and the industry. 

29

A successful program has to have several elements: it has to be 

highly professional, but it does not need to be large in scope or expensive to operate; it needs to have a regional focus and have the 

direct participation with fishermen and support of the Coast 

Guard. 

The success of NPFVOA’s program is evidenced by the attendance in our safety courses, which now exceeds 33,000, of which 70 

percent of that has been voluntary. A safety culture has evolved in 

the Pacific Northwest. Training levels are active in this region, 

which has been a big factor in reducing fatalities. Safety training 

is key to improving how casualties can prevent it and how people 

respond if faced with an emergency. 

NPFVOA’s program was established to address particular problems as we know them in our region. Similar programs could be 

established in any region where the fishing industry itself is willing to adopt a real safety culture to take action themselves. 

While there are many common denominators of going to sea anywhere that apply to all regions, casualty information for each region clearly indicates that peculiarities to fishing—techniques, vessel loading, or environmental conditions in each region—should be 

addressed separately and specifically. 

The Commercial Fishing Industry Vessel Safety Act of 1988 was 

extremely important, I believe, as a first step that provided a 

springboard to national standards for improving safety aboard fishing vessels, but that Act has not generated a program of casualty 

prevention. Coast Guard enforcement of the regulations has been 

inconsistent from region to region. I believe that Coast Guard oversight and enforcement is absolutely critical to improving safety in 

the fishing industry. 

My written testimony illustrates how innovative Coast Guard actions that were recently taken in Alaska have been extremely effective and supported by the industry, in fact, embraced by the industry. 

To conclude, I believe that the 51 percent decline in fatality rates 

among commercial fishermen in Alaska from 1990 to 2006 that 

NIOSH has substantiated are largely due to three things: the safety training infrastructure in the Pacific Northwest and Alaska; the 

emphasis on oversight of the industry and proactive initiatives by 

the Coast Guard in Alaska; and the safety culture that has evolved, 

with many fishermen treating safety as a priority and going way 

beyond the minimum requirements. 

Thank you very much for the opportunity to share my observations. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. 

Captain Collins? 

Mr. COLLINS. Thank you. Good morning, Mr. Chairman and 

Members of the Subcommittee. I am Blaine Collins, Vice President 

and Regional Manager of Det Norske Veritas. I am honored to have 

this opportunity to discuss fishing vessel safety with you today. 

DNV is one of the world’s leading classification societies and has 

worked to improve safety at sea since 1864. Indeed, our corporate 

objective is safeguarding life, property, and the environment by 

managing risk. 

30

In my testimony today, I will describe ship classification and the 

classification process; discuss key conventions of the International 

Maritime Organization, a United Nations Body; brief the Subcommittee on the Torremolinos International Convention for the 

Safety of Fishing Vessels; and share our views to improve fishing 

vessel safety. 

In general terms, classification societies develop rules and standards for the construction of ships. Classification rules primarily 

cover the structural strength and integrity of a ship’s hull, the reliability of the propulsion and steering systems, power generation, 

and other auxiliary ship systems for the safe operation of the ship. 

DNV’s rules are based on the accumulated experience from DNV’s 

large classed fleet, which today is more than 16 percent of world’s 

fleet; our research and development programs; and more than 140 

years of experience. 

Classification societies may also act as recognized organizations 

for flag states, verifying the vessel’s compliance with international 

regulations. DNV has been authorized to perform these statutory 

surveys and issue certificates on behalf of more than 130 flag administrations, including the United States. Today, there are 63 

U.S. flag vessels classified by DNV, including fishing vessels. 

The IMO Safety of Life at Sea SOLAS Convention is generally 

regarded as the most important of all international treaties concerning the safety of merchant ships. The first version was adopted 

in 1914 in response to the Titanic disaster, with successive updates 

through today reflecting technical advances and the demands and 

expectations of society for safety. 

The main objective of the SOLAS Convention is to specify minimum safety standards for the construction, equipment, and operation of ships. Flag states are responsible for ensuring that ships 

under their flag comply with these requirements, and a number of 

certificates are prescribed in the Convention as proof that this has 

been done. Surveys in issuance of these certificates are typically 

delegates to recognized classification societies by the flag state. 

Curiously, SOLAS does not apply to fishing vessels, and this is 

probably a major reason why fishing remains a high-risk occupation. In the absence of common international regulations, national 

regulations have, unfortunately, become unavoidable. A consequence of national versus international regulations, however, is 

that two fishing vessels operating in international waters may be 

subject to very different national regulations. 

While it is encouraging that the existing U.S. requirements for 

life saving and safety equipment have led to a decline in the number of deaths, there has not been a corresponding decrease in the 

number of actual fishing vessel casualties. Clearly, this indicates 

that the technical aspects of the vessel, particularly the strength of 

the hull, the stability of the vessel, watertight integrity, and the reliability of the propulsion and machinery equipment, all of which 

are fully considered in the classification system, are important to 

further improve fishing vessel safety. Simply stated, the safety and 

life saving equipment regulations are helpful, but the safety of fishermen can be greatly improved if we take steps to minimize the 

loss of the vessel, propulsion and machinery failures, and we address the safe operation of equipment. Classification is the interVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00042 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
31

nationally accepted, well-established and effective system that 

achieves these goals for the world’s large cargo passenger vessels. 

It should be mandatory for all fishing vessels greater than 24 meters in length. 

Globally, the safety of fishing vessels has been a concern for 

many years. The IMO convened a convention for fishing vessel 

safety in Torremolinos, Spain in 1977. The convention was not 

widely ratified, but the protocol has been included in a European 

Union Council directive. This directive is intended to fill the gap 

created because SOLAS requirements do not apply to fishing vessels and, in fact, it is often regarded as ‘‘SOLAS for fishing vessels.’’ Most coastal nations in Europe have made this directive part 

of their national regulations. Fishing vessels that comply with this 

EU directive are issued a Fishing Vessel Safety Certificate. DNV 

is authorized to issue these certificates on behalf of European Flag 

Administrations. 

Most of the requirements in the Torremolinos protocol are covered by the DNV classification rules. Also, most European flags 

now require fishing vessels to be built according to the rules of recognized classification societies, especially for structural strength; 

classification societies to ensure that stability requirements are 

met; safety training and certification of t he crew; specific safety 

equipment to be on board and certification requirements for life 

saving, fire fighting, navigation, and other equipment. 

In conclusion, DNV strongly encourages the United States to require classification of fishing vessels greater than 24 meters in 

length and, two, to adopt the requirements of the Torremolinos 

Convention. 

Finally, in implementing these two recommendations, DNV urges 

the United States to seek international solutions and regulations to 

the maximum extent possible, rather than Federal or State regulations. This will provide a uniform standard throughout the world 

in a transparent and predictable regulatory regime. DNV pledges 

to do its part to assist the United States and to work with the rest 

of the world to achieve real and measurable improvements in fishing vessel safety. 

I thank the Committee for its interest in our views and for this 

opportunity to share some of our thinking with you. I would be 

happy to respond to your questions. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Captain. 

Deb Shrader, please. Welcome. 

Ms. SHRADER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for the 

time that you have allowed us to discuss this difficult subject. 

By way of introduction, as noted, I am the Executive Director of 

an organization called Shore Support, Incorporated, which has been 

working in the interest of commercial fishermen in the Port of New 

Bedford for the last 10 years. I am also the wife of Captain Ronnie 

Shrader, who runs two commercial scallopers out of the Port of 

New Bedford, so you can see why I have both a personal and professional interest in what happens with these regulations. 

Shore Support is a committee within our corporation called the 

Fishermen’s Emergency Relief Fund. It was started after the tragic 

loss of the Fishing Vessel Northern Edge in December of 2004. 

Since that time, we have been able to help fishermen in need, some 

32

because of regulatory pressures and, in most cases, because of tragedy at sea, loss of life, with the major wage earner of the family 

being taken away in most cases. 

Recently, I have spent some of each day for the last four months 

with the family members of the Fishing Vessel Lady of Grace, and 

also with one of the families from the vessel Lady Luck of Newbury 

Port. I can tell you that that experience, and also my personal ties 

to the sea through my husband, makes the realities of the ocean 

a sure reality in my life and in my work. 

I also would like to address you primarily as a fisherman’s wife, 

because that is who I am. I started this organization because of my 

love for my husband and because I wanted him to be represented 

by his family. I want you to realize that I and other women like 

me know that there is only so much that we can do to keep our 

men safe at sea. There are things—Mother Nature, the boat being 

small, the ocean being large—we realize that we can’t stop everything from happening. We realize that it is a job that our husbands 

have chosen to do and we, as their wives, have chosen to stand behind them and do everything we can to help them. We know that 

Congress can’t stop all of the deaths, but we do ask for your partnership in the following items that I have chosen to discuss with 

you. 

First of all, safety training. Shore Support has been involved 

with the School for Marine and Science Technologies since 2003 in 

socioeconomic study. In 2005, we visited with 94 percent of our 

ground fish fleet, and by visiting I mean we went boat to boat and 

spoke with the crew members on each of these vessels. I can tell 

you that 90 percent of the men that we spoke with—so 90 percent 

of 94 percent of the fleet—have voluntarily taken use of the safety 

classes that were put together in New Bedford by the Massachusetts Department of Employment and Training, NOAA, the city’s 

mayor, and also the Coast Guard. Many of the men also took the 

conductors classes, allowing them to teach their crew members and 

review on a monthly basis, as required by law, what the crew has 

learned. 

This has had a huge impact not just on the practices of our men, 

but on their perspective of safety at sea, and that perspective is the 

most important thing. When I surveyed the boats in an early study 

in 2003, when I asked the guys where their survival suits were, 

they were like in the fore peak behind the fuel filters and gallons 

of water. Since then, last year when we interviewed our men, they 

were either in the mud room, which is right near the back door, 

in the wheelhouse, or at the foot of their bunks. Now, none of those 

situations is perfect because you never know, when a situation happens at sea, where you will physically be on that boat, but at least 

they are very much aware of where their suits are. 

Another thing that the safety courses have taught our men is 

that many of the guys bought suits years ago and just put them 

on the boat, and we found that during the experience of putting the 

suits on and physically jumping into the water, then jumping into 

the raft in the suits, they found out not just the confidence in going 

from talking about a principle to actually putting it into action that 

they are now going to sea with a lot more confidence. But we also 

found that a lot of the guys had not only gotten older, but they had 

33

gotten larger, so there were many suits that didn’t fit. So through 

the course of the safety classes, we now have well fitted, very well 

suited safety equipment on our boats. 

Let me now go to voluntary dockside inspection. Kevin Coyle is 

a Coast Guard officer in the City of New Bedford that does these 

voluntary inspections in our city. We consider him very, very important to our operations in our fishing industry. We hope that you 

will continue to fund the inspections, but they should be done on 

a voluntary basis. Every fisherman that I talked to—and I have 

more than 150 signed members of Shore Support, and I can walk 

down any dock in New Bedford and some in Gloucester that I 

know, so I have talked to a lot of people—they feel that they want 

to come home. No fisherman leaves port without the sense that he 

is going to come home. If they didn’t have that feeling, they 

wouldn’t fish. So I think that our guys are so over-regulated with 

the ground fish and scallop industry regulations that they themselves want to be kept safe, so they will take advantage of the voluntary inspections. 

Stability inspections of vessels 50 to 79 feet, I totally agree with 

it being mandatory, mostly because of the general category scallop 

licenses that have been added to the multi-species ground fish licenses that are under such pressures. They have taken on the general category scallop license, which allows them to put a 10-foot 

scallop dredge onto their boat and allow them to haul back a scallop dredge, which is completely off balance from what their boat 

was originally designed for. Our boats are going much further and 

further offshore in order to pursue that day at sea being economically viable, so we totally support the mandatory inspection for stability of vessels from 50 to 79 feet. 

Certification and licensing of captains. I do not feel that licensing 

of the current captains and mates of our vessels would be an advantage. In 2003, when I did the study with SMAST with the 

School for Marine and Science Technologies, we found that we have 

a very aging fleet. People are not coming into the fishing industry 

anymore because, between regulations and closed areas, and also 

the fear of life and limb, why deal with it? So what we have in our 

fleet, I can show you by numbers that we have an aging fleet with 

the median age for scallopers is 40 and the median age for ground 

fishermen is 46; and their years at sea balance between 23 and 26 

years at sea experience. So I would say that if you are going to 

make licensing mandatory, that you need to find a way to grandfather in these men. That would be like me driving my car for 25 

years and then you ask me to go and get a license, or you, as Congressmen, sitting there and then someone saying you need more 

qualifications, because even though you brought your community 

billions and billions of dollars of seafood and commerce. So that 

would be a stipulation. 

Also, I think one thing that I am very afraid of—because—Shore 

Support represents the rank and file fishermen—I am very afraid 

that you will transfer the responsibility of accident liability from 

the boat owner to the captain and their mate. Now, fishermen are 

supposed to be self-employed individuals; however, they are not allowed to claim—my husband spent $170,000 on fuel last year. He 

wasn’t able to claim that expense. So they are quasi-self-employed 

34

people. So I am very afraid that when this legislation is drafted, 

that because of the power of the boat owners, that the responsibility for safety at sea will go to the captain. 

Now, what you must understand—and some people say that by 

being captain you are the master of that vessel. I have to disagree 

with you, because I believe that with the communications that are 

now available and with the fleet ownership that is taking place in 

our port, when more and more single people are owning more and 

more vessels, it is called consolidation, which I also am not for—

my husband does not make an individual decision when it comes 

to whether or not it is safe to come home if he wants to keep his 

job. The boat owners are now getting more and more power, where 

my husband has lost some of his power being captain, the personal 

goal that he had. And they are in constant universal communication with the boat owner, so you can lose your job. 

In closing, if I might, I just wanted to mention something that 

you mentioned in the beginning, and that was the expedience of 

implementation of regulation. Since 1976, it has been required that 

social and economic impact has been to taken into effect when looking at regulations regarding fisheries. Since 1976, that law has 

been ignored, and I hope that when you talk about making safety 

part of the regulatory process, that it is at the beginning of the 

process of building these laws, and not like they are doing to me, 

making me study socioeconomics after the dinosaur has already 

walked through the footprint. 

Thank you, gentlemen. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. 

Ms. SHRADER. Oh, pardon me, sir. May I just make one more 

comment? 

I just wanted to make the comment that the Coast Guard people 

that are working out of our port, the Coast Guard people that 

worked with the people that I have been working for from the Fishing Vessel Lady of Grace, showed more compassion and more understanding than I have ever seen from any bureaucratic organization or agency, and I would really just like to let you know that 

they do a fine job in New Bedford and we definitely depend on 

them greatly. I am very grateful to them and I would like that to 

be known. Thank you, sir. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. You will find that this 

Committee are probably some of the strongest advocates of the 

Coast Guard in the Congress, because they come under our jurisdiction, for one thing, and one of the things that we are trying to 

do is to make sure that there is a synchronization between the 

Coast Guard increasing responsibilities and the resources that they 

need to carry out those responsibilities and personnel. 

So we agree with you, we think they do a great job, but we want 

to make sure they maintain that. 

Ms. SHRADER. Yes, sir. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. One of the things that I find very interesting—

and I think all of you have just about touched on this—seems to 

be the whole issue of safety, and I will start with you, Mr. Baines. 

It seems folks have really gotten it, I mean the people in the industry. Is that because, in large part, you have seen so much tragedy, 

do you think? You know, sometimes people, when they think about 

35

safety, they think, oh, later. It is sort of like when you are sitting 

on the airplane and the assistant—what do you call them? 

Ms. SHRADER. Stewardess. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Flight attendant. They used to call them stewardess, and I didn’t know whether that was politically correct. 

But the flight attendant goes through all the things and shows 

you, and some people fall asleep, others read a magazine. It seems, 

though, that in this industry folks have said this light has come on 

and they say, wait a minute, we have got to make sure we deal 

with this. 

Since you are a fisherman, Mr. Baines, would you comment on 

that for me, please? 

Mr. BAINES. I think it is more awareness from the industry’s perspective. You know, there always has been losses of fishermen and 

vessels, but there seems to be more awareness by the fishermen 

today. I don’t know if the fishermen are a little bit more educated 

or just what it is. There are more publications now of ‘‘Commercial 

Fisheries News,’’ the ‘‘National Fisherman,’’ those type of things. 

There are a lot of articles on it through the Internet. There is more 

information out there, so fishermen are more aware of the need for 

training and doing what they need to do to make sure they get 

home to their families. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. And the Maine Commercial Fishing Safety Council, can you tell us about how that came about and what they do? 

Mr. BAINES. It was formed about two and a half years ago, after 

a bad year in the State of Maine. We lost I believe it was either 

11 or 12 fishermen in the previous year. Then Governor Angus 

King put together a task force to see what could be done about enhancing safety for the fishermen, and through the recommendations of the task force the Safety Council was formed, and we have 

been working for a little over two years now. You know how these 

things go, it takes quite a bit of time to get them up and running, 

but we have been working for about two years now on a number 

of different issues, some more successful than others, one that you 

heard of. What we have run into, though, is a stone wall as far as 

preemption and parity is concerned with the Federal Government, 

and what we are looking for from Congress and the Coast Guard 

is to allow the States to enact commercial fishing regulations and 

be a partner with the Coast Guard in safety regulations. 

They all weave together. I mean, a three mile line, guys don’t 

pay attention to where the three mile line is; they fish inside, they 

fish outside. It is very important to distinguish a certain line distance from shore for different types of regulations, but that is why 

the States need to partner with the Coast Guard, to have the same 

regulations for the same vessels fishing in the same areas. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Anyone else want to comment on that? 

Ms. Shrader? 

Ms. SHRADER. I feel that the partnership with NOAA and National Marine Fisheries has brought awareness, and working with 

Kevin, with the rest of the Coast Guard representation in New 

Bedford, and also because the fishing community I think, at least 

in the Northeast Region that I can speak of, it has become just 

more cohesive, where just awareness and a lot of different things 

have come together, including working together for regulatory purVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00047 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
36

pose, and part of that was bringing about the awareness of safety. 

Once NOAA and National Marine Fisheries began to give us funding and help us to put together curriculum, it has been happening 

and people are just being very receptive to it. Every man wants to 

come home. 

Then, just recently, Massachusetts Fishermen’s Partnership did 

another program in New Bedford that was like a continuation, 

where they went on to first aid information and also stability, because we feel that that was a big issue in our loss of the fishing 

vessel ‘‘Lady of Grace.’’ So we are building on the curriculum, so 

I would hope that Congress would help us to fund NOAA to work 

with the community so that we can spread what has worked so 

well in New Bedford and in other places in Alaska, from the last 

testimony, to make these trainings available to people. Fishermen 

will go. It is like build it and they will come. You know, give them 

the opportunity to learn these things, fund them for them, because 

so much has been put on their backs with the regulations, and they 

will go and make use of what you give them. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. How long does that training take? 

Ms. SHRADER. The training takes two days on a weekend, and 

what they do is they do everything from study electrical fires, fires 

on the boat, they jump in their survival suits, they get in the suits 

and get in a raft in the water. My husband, with 20 years of experience, did come home and tell me that he was very much impressed, that he did learn things from the classes, such as electrical fires, that he hadn’t experienced, and was glad to have that 

additional information. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Ms. Backus, you have provided us with quite a 

bit of information about the provision in the current statute that 

creates a significant disparity in regard to required safety equipment between fishing vessels that are numbered by the State and 

those that are documented by the Coast Guard. Describe the major 

difference in required safety equipment for documented versus 

State numbered fishing vessels. Can you break that down for us? 

Ms. BACKUS. Yes, sir. The Commercial Fishing Industry Vessel 

Safety Act has requirements that are in common for the documented and State numbered vessels, and then when the vessels are 

beyond the Boundary Line, the documented vessels have very specific requirements and the State numbered vessels do not. For example, first aid equipment and training is required for a document 

vessels, but first aid equipment and training are not required for 

those State numbered vessel. So a State numbered vessel can be 

beyond the Boundary Line and not have to have a first aid kit and 

not have to have anyone on board who knows how to respond to 

a medical emergency. 

The same goes for guards of exposed hazards, for instance winches for trawlers. There don’t need to be any guards on the trawlers, 

or at least it is not required, for State numbered vessels, but those 

guards are required for documented vessels. 

Navigation information is the same situation: compass; anchors; 

radar reflectors; communication equipment; high water alarms in 

some cases; bilge systems; electronic position fixing devices; emergency instruction; and then also monthly drills and safety orientation. All those that I just named are required by law to be on docuVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00048 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
37

mented vessels, not required by law to be on State numbered vessels. However, some of those items are, of course, on State numbered vessels because vessels go out with anchors and they do go 

out with compass, but they are not required. 

The most important thing here is that there is no safety training 

or drill conductor course required for those State numbered vessels 

that go beyond the Boundary Line. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Ms. Hughes, you state that while the Act made 

improvements to the industry’s response capabilities, the current 

need is to improve the prevention of casualties. Other than the 

strategies for improving safety that have been implemented for 

Bering Sea crab fleet, what other measures do you feel should be 

taken to prevent vessel losses? 

Ms. HUGHES. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. One of the things that 

has been done in Alaska that has been enormously effective and it 

is something that is done on passenger vessels is going beyond having this new requirement, there has been a lot of discussion about 

requiring that when crews conduct drills, that that be logged. But 

the Coast Guard in the Seattle area and Alaska have started to require that crews demonstrate that they can conduct effective drills, 

and it was very interesting to see how that was responded to by 

the industry. 

This is a very interesting industry, and I think this applies nationally, that it is very competitive. So, immediately, the first several crews that were asked to demonstrate their proficiencies were 

not entirely satisfied with their performance and they wanted the 

Coast Guard to come back. Then it ended up that they actually 

wanted to be graded, and then the word started spreading that 

people were going to have to show that they knew what they were 

doing, and it was immediately apparent. If the crews had not been 

conducting monthly drills, there was no question that you could 

tell. So it reinforced a sense of importance about it, that the Coast 

Guard cared if they were doing them well. 

I would just like to add one other element of why this enforcement is so critical. The drills, even in our area, had not been enforced before the ‘‘Galaxy’’ fire. So when the Coast Guard held their 

investigation of that emergency situation—three people had died in 

it; the rest of the crew survived, but it was quite incredible that 

they weren’t all lost—the captain and the chief engineer were sitting in a separate position during the investigation because they 

were potentially criminally liable and they had no idea that by not 

conducting monthly drills they had that sort of exposure. So I think 

you can also make the additional case that if the regulations are 

written and then not enforced, and we have this conversation that 

I question about authority, if it is written in the regulations, do 

they not have the authority? It is hard to understand. 

From our perspective of being a training entity, it is awkward to 

be telling people that, yes, you absolutely need to do this, it is written here, and then some people could argue that, well, do we stand 

to gain by that. So it is a problem that I think the enforcement, 

if there is a question of authority, then hopefully you can help the 

Coast Guard get whatever authority they need, but it is really time 

to get on with getting these things that are written in the regs enforced. 

38

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much. 

Mr. LaTourette? 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank all of you for your testimony. I appreciate it. 

Ms. Shrader, yours struck home in particular in that I have a 

whole closet full of suits that I don’t think I am going to be able 

to get into in the near future, so I know the experience. 

Ms. Hughes, in your testimony you have the number 33,000. Is 

that the number of classes conducted or is that the number of participants that have shown up for your training? 

Ms. HUGHES. That would be the participants. Some of them 

choose to repeat, so I can’t say it is individuals. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. I am more than impressed with the work that 

your organization has done. My question is 33,000 is a lot, but 

what sort of buy-in do you think you have from the fishing community in your region, is it 70 percent, 80 percent? 

Ms. HUGHES. Well, it does vary by the fleets, so the smaller 

boats, we have fewer of the smaller boats—and I think some of 

that might be economics—that belong. We have a membership 

base. No one is excluded, but the membership base allows us to 

have constant communication with the industry. It is a word of 

mouth industry in a lot of ways, like what I described with competition. There is a lot of peer pressure. So as people come in for 

classes, they tend to talk about, say, that they did that, they will 

say that there was value in it, and then somebody else thinks, well, 

he did that, I should do it too. It continues to build momentum, 

and I think that is how you create the safety culture. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. To Ms. Backus and Mr. Baines, one of the 

great tensions between the United States Congress and State legislatures is this whole notion of preemption. It even divides the parties sometimes. The Republican party is often identified with 

States’ rights, but on certain issues we become the biggest federalists you ever saw. Likewise, the Democratic party is most associated with the Federal form of Government, but on some issues they 

become the biggest States’ rights guys you ever saw. So this whole 

issue of parity is of interest to me, and we deal with it in financial 

services, we deal with it in safety regulations. We just had it with 

the Class 1 railroads, for instance. So I want to be clear on what 

it is you think—I understand the problem you are describing, but 

I guess I would like to hear from you how you propose we fix it. 

But just before I ask you that sort of general question, you are 

not saying, Mr. Baines, that the current law prohibits the State of 

Maine from establishing and implementing safety regulations for 

State registered vessels operating wholly within State waters, are 

you? That is not what you are saying? 

Mr. BAINES. The way I understand it is Federal law prohibits the 

State of Maine from adopting any commercial fishing safety regulations for their State registered boats, and the ability to enforce 

those regulations. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. And it is your understanding that that is true 

for vessels that operate wholly within State waters? 

Mr. BAINES. Yes, that is true. The Coast Guard can enforce Federal regulations both in and out, but common sense would dictate 

that you have the same regulations in State waters as you do outVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00050 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
39

side State waters, and the ability to enforce those regulations, right 

now the State of Maine can only have recreational standards apply 

to their boats. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. We are going to check that out, because I 

agree with you that common sense dictates the other. I am not so 

sure that the State of Maine or any State can’t make safety regulations on commercial fishing vessels that operate wholly within 

State waters, but I would like to correspond with you on that. 

Let’s go to the issue of parity. How do you think we fix it? Is it 

that we should butt out and let each State act or should we propose 

and propound a national standard and preempt the States from 

acting as long as our regulations are decent? Ms. Backus? 

Ms. BACKUS. Thank you. There may be a variety of options here. 

One option is to have the Coast Guard Safety Act cover all vessels 

equally so that the documented and the State numbered vessels 

are covered within the State waters and beyond the three mile line, 

for example. Another one would be for the Coast Guard to do what 

it can do and then to allow the States to make some adjustments 

based on local conditions. For example, the State of Maine, by and 

large, we are a cold water State, as is Alaska, so for virtually 12 

months of the year our fishermen are in cold water. That is very 

different, as the Representative mentioned, than——

Mr. LATOURETTE. The Gulf Coast. 

Ms. BACKUS.—the Gulf Coast, exactly. So there may be a chance 

for States that have special conditions to address those conditions 

if they are not able to be addressed at the Federal level. 

So I think that it will take some collaboration among all of us 

to find the right place where we can promote safety and promote 

parity at the same time. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Okay. 

Mr. Baines, does your answer differ significantly from that? 

Mr. BAINES. I would just like to add to that, which would—because along with it is the issue of the Boundary Line. In the State 

of Maine it comes to shore in places; it is 20 miles off shore in other 

places To truly address the whole issue of parity, the Boundary 

Line also I think plays a very important role in truly illuminating 

the Boundary Line. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. Okay. One of the difficulties sometimes when 

we get into this preemption fight is that you have a national standard, and if it is sufficient, you recognize a national standard is 

needed because sometimes States do stuff that just don’t make 

sense. I mean, the Federal Government does stuff that doesn’t 

make sense from time to time, too. 

I think I like your answer a lot, Ms. Backus, in that if we had 

a Federal standard and empowered the Coast Guard to have something—I mean, some of this stuff is no brainer; I mean, first aid 

training and how to put out fires and how to get in your survival 

suits. So if we had a national standard that covered all, the entire 

Country, do you think it would be acceptable if we permitted the 

States to continue to act, but only in those areas that were unique 

to Maine, Alaska, or Mr. Taylor’s concern, the Gulf Coast? Would 

that be a reasonable way to get at this, do you think? 

Ms. BACKUS. Well, I am not able to speak for all the other States, 

I guess, but I think having the States have the option to collaboVerDate 0ct 09 2002 19:58 Feb 25, 2008 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00051 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 P:\DOCS\35915 HTRANS1 PsN: JASON
40

rate with the Coast Guard around certain special conditions that 

may exist, either by the type of fishery—because some fisheries are 

more hazardous than others—or by the conditions in which those 

fisheries do their work, that that would be a reasonable approach 

to this, yes. 

Mr. LATOURETTE. I do too. 

Listen, I want to thank all of you for coming. I have learned 

something today, so thank you very much for your testimony. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. I want to thank you too. 

Just a few more questions for Captain Collins. Captain, you have 

told us about classification, and the things that you have told us 

have been very helpful. I guess you recommend that the U.S. require classification of all fishing vessels greater than 24 meters in 

length by a recognized classification society. Are you suggesting 

this requirement for all vessels or just new construction? 

Mr. COLLINS. Thank you for that question, Mr. Chairman. That 

is a very complicated question to answer. My first response would 

be that absolutely it should be required for all new vessels. But I 

think that the regulation would have to have some sort of phasein period, because clearly the vessels that have not been built to 

classification society requirements and are operating today would 

probably require substantial upgrades in order to meet those requirements. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. And probably pretty expensive. 

Mr. COLLINS. I believe so. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. In many instances, I would take it. 

Mr. COLLINS. Yes, I believe so. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. So that would be a substantial burden on 

those——

Mr. COLLINS. On the existing fishing vessel owners. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. And I guess some kind of grandfather clause 

would help. Well, it doesn’t help. You have got so many out there. 

Mr. COLLINS. Yes. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. So it is going to take a long time for them to be 

no longer used. I guess you are talking about 20 or 30 years before 

you can have, say, 95 percent of your vessels be subject to the new 

rules. 

Mr. COLLINS. I think it is easy to make it effective for all new 

construction vessels. For the existing vessels, I think that perhaps 

the decision-making process should consider a study that looks at 

the average age of the fishing vessel fleet. Let’s say that the average age of the fishing vessel fleet is 15 years. Then perhaps there 

might be a tenure time period after which those vessels would have 

to meet the classification requirements or they should be replaced 

with new vessels built to classification rules. 

Mr. CUMMINGS. As we close the hearing, I want to thank all of 

our witnesses today for being part of this hearing. What we try to 

do here is gather as much information as we possibly can, and as 

I am sure you are well aware, the hearing only is a small part of 

what we do to try to come up with solutions to problems. The thing 

that I hope that you will always keep in mind is that this process 

is one that allows you to touch people that you don’t even know 

41

and will never meet, and perhaps even touch generations yet unborn. 

A lot of people come to these hearings and they say, well, you 

know, I had to fly down and I had to get up early and whatever, 

and then I had to testify and then I had to hear these questions 

from these folks and be a little nervous at times, although you all 

were very cool. But it is all for a purpose. It is all about us trying 

to create a better world, and in this instance create a safer world, 

going back to what you were saying, Ms. Shrader, so that husbands 

and wives and others that go out to sea will come back. 

And it is very refreshing—and I know Mr. LaTourette agrees 

with me—to hear, Mr. Baines, that fishermen and women and others in the industry realize how significant this whole thing of safety is and the fact that there is a connection between training and 

saving of lives. I mean, that is so significant and sort of hard to 

figure out how many lives you save. I know we can look at the 

stats, but just the idea that we have seen a reduction when there 

was this training, that says a whole lot. 

So we are going to do the best we can. Again, I say this not only 

to this panel, but the other panel. There will probably be some 

things that we will be sending to you, questions just to follow up 

on what we have done here today, but we are going to try to do 

everything in our power—I am sure you all heard my little thing 

about the clock ticking—to do all that we can while the clock is still 

ticking to make things better. 

Anything else, Mr. LaTourette? 

[No response.] 

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you all very much. This hearing is coming 

to an end. 

[Whereupon, at 12:08 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]

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