Anchorage Daily News

The destruction of Chignik Bay's lone fish processing plant, which went up in flames Monday, threatened to paralyze what is already a dismal salmon season.

But even before the ashes from the massive fire that tore through the Trident Seafoods Corp. plant in Chignik Bay had finished smoldering Tuesday, operations to keep the community's salmon fishery alive were in full swing.

Tender vessels were beginning to haul local catches more than 100 miles to another plant in Sand Point, and a floating processing vessel, the Aleutian Falcon, was on its way to help with the load.

"It's not going to cripple the fishery," Axel Kopun, president of the Chignik Seafood Producers Alliance, said of the fire that burned the plant in the Alaska Peninsula community that employed hundreds.

But the loss will present some challenges to the fishery and town, he said.

The fire broke out Monday afternoon in a power house, then swelled to envelop the attached cannery. Plant workers and locals fought the flames and smoke for about two hours before pulling back and evacuating a half-mile area because of safety concerns. The fire, burning unchecked, destroyed the cannery but spared surrounding structures, tribal administrator Debbie Carlson said.

"It's still smoky, but the wind is blowing toward the mountains still, so we're still in no danger here on the village side," she said 24 hours after the fire broke out. "It's smoldering out a little bit."

Four people suffered smoke inhalation and were treated at the local clinic, with one flown to Anchorage to be examined by a doctor, said Joe Plesha, Trident's chief legal officer.

Two deputy fire marshals and an Alaska State Trooper flew to the scene Tuesday but could not begin their investigation because the building was still on fire into the evening, troopers spokeswoman Beth Ipsen said. Damage estimates to the 50,000 square-foot cannery could reach up to $5 million, including roughly 300,000 pounds of processed fish that was lost, she said.

The plant was insured, but Trident had not begun discussing whether to rebuild, Plesha said Tuesday.

"It's been pretty calm here considering the small village and pretty big event," said Mark Stichert, area management biologist with the state Department of Fish and Game. "I haven't heard any scramblings; I haven't heard any people worried about markets and I haven't heard people concerned about what's going to happen with the fishery."

The loss means just a few of the cannery's roughly 250 employees will stay on to fill positions aboard the Aleutian Flacon, with the rest being put up in a nearby, non-operational cannery Seattle-based Trident also owns until they can be flown home in coming days, Plesha said.

The tenders' migration to Sand Point, getting under way Tuesday, appeared poised to keep the fishery afloat, but at a cost.

"All the fish from Chignik Lagoon, where they're only 40 minutes from the cannery where they're being caught, are going to have to be hauled all the way to Sand Point now, so that's an exchange from a 40-minute trip to a 12- to 14-hour trip," Kopun said. "So that's pretty significant. It can't be good for quality."

The tenders had already been used routinely to transport fish from local seiners to the Chignik cannery, but the sustained long-distance run was almost certain to drive up costs as the vessels burn through more gas.

"Obviously, it is far less efficient to do it that way because of fuel costs and everything else," Plesha said. "But the good news is we're not going to disrupt any buying activities, so we will continue to buy fish as we would have if the plant remained open."

The effects on the community of 80 people about 450 miles southwest of Anchorage remained to be seen Tuesday. While the employees of the plant were not local, the plant is an economic boom for the local economy, Carlson said. In addition to employees spending money in town, the cannery itself is the source of the taxes the town collects.

"The city of Chignik will lose all that tax revenue they get from having that processor buying the fish locally," Kopun said. "So that's a big blow to the community. And these communities are already in pretty bad shape. That's basically their source of income."

Kopun, from Chignik, said the fishery there has been troubled for some time. And this year isn't shaping up any better.

With 377,000 sockeye salmon caught as of Sunday, the fishery is on track to catch less than half its average haul, Stichert said. There are nearly 100 state issued permits for the fishery, but only 53 of them are fishing this season.

"Sockeye seem to be late and the run appears to be a bit weak, certainly behind average, and so at this point it appears that even though they're tendering those fish all the way to Sand Point, there shouldn't be a drop in capacity," Stichert said. "The fishermen should have an opportunity to sell all their fish."

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