Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries reports Aller Aqua for fish escape

Norway’s Directorate of Fisheries has leveled a charge against Aller Aqua Norway it did not meet legal standards for preventing a salmon escape at Aller Aqua’s Vadheim, Norway facility in October 2022.

The company reported the escape on 29 October, 2022 after discovering a four-by-four meter hole in the wall of a net-pen at its farming facility. It estimated roughly 35,000 salmon had escaped through the hole.

Norway’s Directorate of Fisheries ordered the company to monitor the environment surrounding the farm and to remove escaped fish from 11 nearby waterways. Aller Aqua subsequently offered a reward to anyone who delivered any of the escaped fish to a reception station in Vadheim, Norway. 

Follow-up inspections of the facilities resulted in the director's official ruling a breach in regulations had allowed the escape to occur.

“When we followed up the escape incident, we found several deviations during inspections,” Norwegian Directorate of Fisheries Acting Section Head for Section Reactions Gudrun Egge said in a release. 

The company has now been reported for “various breaches of aquaculture legislation,” it said.

“Our starting point is to ensure proper operation in order to protect the environment to the greatest extent possible. Operation in accordance with the regulations also means preventing and minimizing the risk of environmental damage,” Egge said. “It is a prerequisite that the industry complies with the conditions for operation, if the aquaculture industry is to be sustainable.”