Episode 661: The Less Deadly Catch

By
Jess Jiang
and
Robert Smith
WNYC | Apr 11, 2018

Note: This episode originally ran in 2015.

What kind of person would go out in a tiny boat in dangerous weather to catch fish for 24 hours straight? Everyone. Well, everyone in Homer, Alaska.

Halibut fishermen in Alaska used to defy storms, exhaustion and good judgment. That's because they could only fish in these handful of 24-hour periods. It was called the derby, and the derby made fishing the deadliest job in America. But then the government totally changed the system.

Today on the show, the economic fix that made fishing safer. And why a lot of people hate it.

Music: "Everything."

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