Helen FieldsScience Writer

Part of my standard description of why people should care about the Bering Sea is: It has huge fisheries. You know the show Deadliest Catch, on Discovery? That’s in the Bering Sea.

So, *do* you know the show Deadliest Catch? I have to admit I’ve never seen it. I don’t have cable, and it didn’t occur to me until right now that it might be Netflixable, and I just put my Netflix account on hold yesterday, because – perhaps I mentioned – I’m going out of town for six weeks.

Deadliest Catch is a reality show about crab fishermen in the Bering Sea. Fishing has one of the highest fatality rates of any occupation – lots of shoving stuff over the side of the boat, using winches and heavy nets, and working in horrible weather, plus you aren’t usually particularly close to medical facilities.

Actually, I think the first time I heard about the show was when my friend Kate wrote about the show in 2006 for The Daily Astorian – one of the ships’ captains lives near Astoria, Oregon, so she went to watch it at his house.

I hear it’s exciting. I should really watch it sometime. Here’s the show blog.