In the 1970s and 80s, commercial crab fishing earned a deadly reputation, but fishermen opposed mandated safety regulations. With powerful politicians behind it, the commercial fishing industry fought against government interference of any kind, but when a bereaved mother took up the fight, Congress finally forced safety upon the most dangerous occupation in the United States.
Each summer, young men and women flock to Alaska, looking for adventure and a chance to make good money for a few months of work. They’ve heard the stories and watched shows like The Deadliest Catch, and they dream of adventure and riches. Unfortunately, though, the truth is not nearly as glamorous as the shows they’ve watched or the stories they’ve read. Topline fishing operations only want to hire experienced crew members who know what they are doing. The least appealing hire to the owner of a fishing boat is a kid out of college for the summer who wants to “experience life.” These eager young people are likely to find jobs on lower tier boats, the ones struggling to make ends meet.
In 1985, Peter Barry, a 20-year-old Yale anthropology student, flew to Kodiak Island for a summer adventure. He was one of the annual 15,000 summer workers in the Alaska fishing industry. Barry met Gerald Bouchard on a dock in Kodiak, and Bouchard, the captain of the Western Sea, offered Barry a job as a crewman on his salmon seiner. Peter jumped at the opportunity to work aboard a fishing boat in Alaska, and he called his parents with the good news.
After a few days aboard the Western Sea, Peter sent his parents a letter, and his tone sounded much less optimistic. He reported the boat didn’t seem seaworthy, and the captain’s temper often flared, his behavior erratic. Peter wanted to leave the vessel, but the captain threatened him, and Peter decided to stay aboard awhile longer.
On August 20, 1985, a fisherman spotted the body of a young man floating in the water near Kodiak Island. In the man’s pocket they found a letter addressed to Peter Barry. The Western Sea was lost, and out of a six-man crew, searchers found the bodies of only two other men. One of the bodies recovered was Captain Gerald Bouchard’s, and a toxicology exam on Bouchard’s body indicated he was high on cocaine the day the Western Sea went down.
Peter Barry’s father, Bob, flew to Kodiak and demanded answers. Bob Barry was the former U.S. Ambassador to Bulgaria and the current head of the U.S. delegation to the Conference on Disarmament in Europe. When Barry asked questions, he expected answers, but what he learned in Kodiak appalled him. The crewman Peter had replaced on the Western Sea told Barry the old wooden boat, built in 1915, was rotten and leaky and had no pumps. The captain refused to spend money on safety gear, so the vessel had no life raft, survival suits, life preservers, nor an EPIRB to transmit a distress signal. The Western Sea was nothing more than a death trap with a captain fueled by rage and cocaine.
What shocked Bob Barry and his wife, Peggy, more than anything, though, was when they learned commercial fishing boats were not required to carry safety gear or have annual inspections. Even though it was the most dangerous industry in the United States, commercial fishing remained mostly unregulated from the standpoint of safety.
Peggy Barry sank into depression after her son died, but then she began to receive phone calls from others who had lost loved ones on fishing boats. Peggy decided she needed to spearhead the movement to incite change. Something needed to be done to regulate safety equipment and procedures on commercial fishing boats.
Fishermen did not appreciate Peggy Barry’s interference, and she was thought of by the industry as a “privileged outsider.” National Fisherman quoted a lobbyist as saying, “Fishermen have been dying for years, then one Yalie dies, and the whole world seems up in arms.”
Peggy ignored the push-back from fishermen and continued to approach senators and representatives with her concerns. Representative Gary Studds from Massachusetts agreed with Barry and took up her cause.
Because so many fishing boats, especially in Alaska, sank in the mid-eighties, insurance premiums for commercial fishing boat owners jumped dramatically. Insurance premiums on an average fishing vessel rose from $34,000 in 1976 to $169,000 in 1986. Congressmen from states supporting robust fishing industries rushed to pass a bill for insurance relief. Studds saw this as a chance to further his cause. If Congress could agree on a law requiring stiffer safety regulations along with lower insurance premiums, perhaps it could mandate safety for crew members on fishing boats.
Peggy Barry contacted the parents and wives of young men (most lost crew members were young men) who had died on fishing boats, and with an unflinching Peggy Barry by their sides, they addressed the Congressional subcommittee on merchant marine and fisheries. Each loved-one told his or her story and pleaded with the congressmen for safety reform in the commercial fishing industry.
In the end, Peggy Barry and her comrades made some progress. The Coast Guard could not support a provision in the proposed bill requiring all fishing vessels to undergo stability tests. The Coast Guard also felt it could not demand licensing for captains and crews. The final law required commercial fishing vessels to carry life rafts, survival suits, and emergency radio beacons. All crewmen must also take safety training, and a $5,000 penalty could be imposed for failure to comply. The bill ordered the Coast Guard to terminate the unsafe operation of any fishing vessel.
While this bill was a watered-down version of what Peggy Barry wanted, it brought much-needed safety regulations to the most dangerous industry in the U.S. While fishermen were not happy with the new law, indisputable proof shows the new measures made their jobs less deadly. In the year 1983, long before the bill demanding new safety measures, 245 commercial fishermen died at sea. Over time, the death rate has dropped. Between 2000 and 2014, over 14-years, 179 individuals died in fishing-related incidents in Alaska. The mortality rate has fallen to an average of 13 crew members per year. While this number is still too high, it is an improvement.
If you would like to read more about the dangers of commercial fishing, I suggest the book, Lost at Sea by Patrick Dillon. He tells the true story of two ships mysteriously capsizing in the Bering Sea. I’ve read the book three times and was captivated each time by the way Dillon recounted this tragic tale.
Robin Barefield is the author of four Alaska wilderness mystery novels, Big Game, Murder Over Kodiak, and The Fisherman’s Daughter, and Karluk Bones. You are invited to watch her webinar about how she became an author and why she writes Alaska wilderness mysteries. Also, sign up below to subscribe to her free, monthly newsletter on true murder and mystery in Alaska, and listen to her podcast, Murder and Mystery in the Last Frontier.
