Thousands of Atlantic Salmon Escape Puget Sound Fish Farm

Commercial fishing boats are scrambling to catch as many Atlantic salmon as they can after a net pen broke near Puget Sound’s Cyprus Island. Fishers reported of thousands of the non-native fish jumping in the water or washing ashore.

A fish farm’s net pen broke over the weekend after an anchor pulled loose and metal walkways twisted about. Onlookers said it looked like hurricane debris.

It’s possible more than 300,000 Atlantic salmon were released.

Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife officials blamed the structure failure on high tides caused by the eclipse, but tidal waters had been higher in July.

Kurt Beardslee is the director of Wild Fish Conservancy Northwest. He calls the escapement an “environmental nightmare.”

 “The Atlantic salmon bring with them pollution, virus and parasite amplification. All that harms Pacific salmon and our waters of Washington,” Beardslee said.

Lummi Nation fishers said they worry that endangered chinook salmon could wind up as bycatch.

Officials from the fish farm did not return requests for comment.

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