Vol. 5, No. 5  May 2000    News & Comment for and by the Fishermen of Maine          SUBSCRIBE NOW!!
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Table of Contents

Editorial:
     Lack of Logic
     or Dumber Than Dumb.....2

Whose Seaweed Is It?...........8

Snowe on Reauthorization of
     Magnuson-Stevens
     Act.....................................10

The Height of Frustation.....12

Tuna Outlook........................14

Launchings............................16

NEFMC  Meetings................18

Easter Sunday.......................19

DMR...Experimental
    Halibut Fishery.................20

DMR to Hold
    Open Meetings.................21

Drill Conductor
    Course Offered..................22

Categorizing Scallop
    Fishing Equipment to
    Understand Hazards........22

Study to Help Prevent
    Entanglement in
    Trap Rope..........................23

Talk to Me.............................24

The Boot................................25

Music Review.......................25

Classifieds.............................26


MANAGING EDITOR
Bill Crowe

LAYOUT & DESIGN
Lance Lobo

TYPESETTING
Roberta Lobo

STAFF WRITERS
Bernice Johnson
Paul Molyneaux

CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
Kittridge Johnson
Mike Crowe
Lee S. Wilbur

SALES MANAGER
Bill Crowe
 
Mack Point Pollution
by Paul Molyneaux

     The Maine Department of Transportation (MDOT), in partnership with a Swedish-owned company, Sprague Energy, plans to dump 375,000 cubic yards of dredge spoils, at least 14 percent of it contaminated, into the middle of some of the state's most productive lobster grounds. MDOT and Sprague hope to deposit the dredge spoils, from the Mack Point Redevelopment Project, onto a federally managed open ocean disposal site between Rockland and Vinalhaven.

"If it's a State mission to have this port, we want it handled responsibly."
---Sue Lessard
    But the proposal has met with strong opposition from many fishermen and community leaders around western Penobscot Bay.

    "I'm not a scientist, but I'm intelligent enough to know this is not a good idea," said Sue Lessard, town manager of Vinalhaven.
    According to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, almost half of the dredge material has been deemed unsuitable for open ocean uncontained disposal. "Contaminates in the dredge material include elevated levels of lead and mercury, polyaromatic hydrocarbons (petroleum dirivatives), and some PCBs," said Jay Clement, senior project manager at the

U.S. Army Corps of Engineer's Maine project office.
    "The material has not been tested for dioxin," said Clement. Clement added that the Corps would run tests for dioxin if requested to by other agencies, such as Maine's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), "provided tests were deemed necessary in order to make an informed decision," he added.
    Mack Point represents the third and final leg of Governor Angus King's goal to establish three ports in Maine.
    continue

Kennebec Ice
by Mike Crowe

     The availability of ice to put in drinks, chill beer, deep fish or for its many other uses is assumed today, at least in America. It was not always so available and still is not in most of the world. In the days before refrigeration to make and preserve it, ice was made available, by by different means.      The Romans had used snow for summer cooling. Parisian aristocrats enjoyed ice cream in the 15th century. The royal governer of Virginia had an ice house at his place in Williamsburg. George Washington supervises ice harvesting at Mount Vernon. In America,

as early as the 1600s ice was cut on rivers and lakes and the blocks stored in ice houses. City ice depots were supplied by farmers who sawed chunks out of local ponds.

     In 1806 a shipment of ice was sent to the Caribbean from Boston for the first time. Frederic Tudor sent the ice to Martinique on speculation, but unable to find storage, the cargo melted.
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