Author: Joe Viechnicki, KFSK

Fishing was a little better in a second summer commercial troll season for king salmon in Southeast. Trollers were allowed to target kings for five days in mid-August and landed an estimated 26,000-27,000 chinook, about four thousand fish above the target for that opening.

As researchers completed mapping a fault line on the ocean floor off Southeast Alaska this summer, they’ve come to learn some surprising things about a seismically active part of the globe. Scientists expect more strong earthquakes from the Queen Charlotte-Fairweather fault but don’t think this type of geological feature would create a widespread tsunami.

Southeast Alaska’s commercial pink salmon catch will wind up way below forecasts, the lowest harvest in more than four decades. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game’s pink and chum salmon project leader for Southeast Andy Piston said the region’s commercial catch this summer is 7.3 million fish.

Weather kept Governor Bill Walker from attending a signing ceremony for a pharmacy bill in Petersburg this morning. Walker was unable to fly to Petersburg for the signing of House bill 240. It’s a bill that creates tighter regulation on pharmacy benefit managers, or PBMs. Those are companies hired by health insurance providers to negotiate drug prices with the companies that make the medications and the businesses that sell them.