NOAA is looking for a fishing boat to carry its scientists across the Gulf and Aleutians

NOAA is looking to hire an Alaska fishing vessel for a 55-day scientific voyage through the Gulf of Alaska and the Aleutian Islands, and vessel owners have until Aug. 28 to bid.

The charter would carry scientists from the Alaska Fisheries Science Center on the biennial bottom trawl survey of Alaska groundfish, the seafloor census that helps set how much of the state's most valuable stocks the fleet can catch each year. It rides on a working fishing boat by necessity: NOAA doesn't own enough research vessels to cover Alaska's waters, so every couple of years it hires the commercial fleet, and a private vessel and crew spend the better part of two months trawling survey stations across some of the roughest water anywhere.

The survey would run in 2027, with options that could bring the same vessel back through 2032. Owners have to submit a stability letter, crew histories and past-performance references to bid.

One wrinkle: the solicitation is ambiguous about who can compete. One document describes the job as set aside for small businesses while the cover form marks it as not, and the paperwork doesn't resolve which is right. Under the standard that would apply, a fishing company with up to 550 employees still counts as small.