BLUE HILL – The Lifejackets for Lobstermen Project has two vans that, by the end of October, will have visited 43 harbors along the coasts of Maine and Massachusetts. Stocked with 11 different models of lifejackets and buoyancy aids, the vans are giving fishermen everywhere the opportunity to try on personal flotation devices (PFDs) to …
ELLSWORTH — When the Maine Lobstermen’s Association informed the National Marine Fisheries Service at the end of August that it was withdrawing its support for the agency’s proposed whale protection rules, it also offered a list of 10 “actions” NMFS should take. The proposed rules could force lobstermen to remove half their vertical buoy lines …
CASTINE – Hurricane Dorian, which devastated parts of the Bahamas and did serious damage along the Carolina coastal plain and in Nova Scotia, largely spared Maine, but its fringe effects were enough to delay the starts of two weekend regattas hosted by Maine Maritime Academy. The Harman Trophy, sailed in Colgate 26 sloops, and the …
ELLSWORTH – The Department of Marine Resources has scheduled three public hearings on its proposed dates for the upcoming 2019-2020 scallop fishing season. The first hearing is scheduled for today, Thursday, Sept. 12, at 6 p.m. at DMR headquarters in Augusta. On Monday, Sept. 16, DMR will hold a public hearing at 6 p.m. at …
LUBEC — Adam Atherton of Waltham will join the Maine Marine Patrol’s Lubec patrol in the spring after completing the 18-week Maine Criminal Justice Academy’s (MCJA) Basic Law Enforcement Training Program. A graduate of Ellsworth High School, Atherton has served as a sternman on commercial fishing vessels, an automotive technician, a marine technician, boat builder …
KENNEBUNK — It’s not just that proposed federal rules intended to protect endangered right whales from entanglement with fishing gear will be expensive and difficult to implement, industry representatives say. It’s also that they won’t work. That’s the argument Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association, made in a letter sent to NOAA …
SURRY — More than a decade ago, the Environmental Protection Agency adopted new “Tier 4” emission standards covering marine diesel engines used in, among other vessels, lobster boats. Phased in over a period of years, by the end of 2017 the rules effectively limited diesel engines used in commercial boats to no more than 805 …
ELLSWORTH — Recreational boating deaths in the United States dropped by nearly 4 percent last year, but more than 600 boaters died in 2018 while engaged in what is supposed to be the pursuit of fun. Last week, the U.S. Coast Guard released its 2018 Recreational Boating Statistics Report and the news was mixed. While …
BROOKLIN — When elements combine with seemingly magical results, the process is often described as “alchemy.” And when noted yacht designer Bill Tripp got together with three Maine boatyards — The Hinckley Co. in Trenton, the Brooklin Boat Yard and the Front Street Shipyard in Belfast — the result was literally Alchemy, a modern, Bill …
ELLSWORTH — A $20-million grant announced by the National Science Foundation earlier this month will fund a five-year initiative by Maine science institutes to revolutionize the understanding and management of coastal ocean ecosystems, the Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences reported recently. The grant will fund the first large-scale effort to develop a cutting-edge, DNA-based toolset …
BLUE HILL — For the past 15 years or so, members of the Kollegewidgwok Yacht Club have looked on the club’s youth sailing program as something of a mixed blessing. Most KYC members cheer the programs of the Kollegewidgwok Sailing Education Association (KSEA), formally established in 2013, as a good way to engage youngsters in …
BAR HARBOR — The cruise ship slows to seven or eight knots but doesn’t stop for its rendezvous with the boat that has come to pick up the harbor pilot who guided the big ship out of Frenchman Bay on its departure from Bar Harbor. As the bow of the ship cuts through the water, …
