Fire damages Port Moller seafood plant

A 100-year-old Peter Pan Seafoods processing facility at Port Moller has suffered extensive damage in a fire of undetermined cause, shutting down the plant for the rest of the season, but resulting in no injuries.

Officials at Peter Pan Seafoods headquarters in Seattle declined comment, except to say that an investigation is underway into the cause of the blaze, which began on Aug. 15 and burned through the night.

Port Moller has no local government or fire department.

Several people who were in Port Moller at the time told reporter Dave Bendinger of KDLG public radio in Dillingham that several boats used their hoses to spray directly onto the spreading fire, but had little luck in containing the blaze.

The Port Moller facility is a salmon processing plant, which processes mainly sockeyes, but also produces small amounts of king, coho and chum salmon.

Prior to the first the plant had the capacity to process about 250,000 pounds of salmon daily.

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Peter Pan was buying fish from and supporting a fleet of 105 drift gillnetters and 30 set netters, both resident and non-resident fishermen

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