Fisheries committee  I'd like to say the same. I don't want to imagine not having the American market.

Fisheries committee  Not me, no. We have an association that has partnered with a university and we'll be writing a report as soon as the testing is done. I plan to test the weak rope and weak links during the season and, further to that, get some more data from those trials.

Fisheries committee  I've given it some thought throughout the summer, and from everything I've seen, I think we can't be hauling plastics and weak links like that. We could develop a rope, as Heather spoke about earlier, but it's hard for a rope manufacturer to design a rope that's going to work in our LFA because of the time of year, the tides and the size of the sea.

Fisheries committee  We should extend the fund or extend the timeline in which it will be implemented. I think we've heard across the testimony that none of it has worked so far. I'd hate to try something and risk having all this ghost gear. When I say significant, I mean significant. The potential of losing 50% of your traps on the first day is a real possibility, not to mention the thousands of pounds of trapped lobster and the impact on the economy.

Fisheries committee  No, not at this time, as we haven't implemented this weak rope or these weak links yet. I can say that every piece of plastic that made it to the surface and exploded into the block or hauler fractured and has the potential to hurt one of my men. I think this will only get worse as the water cools off and that plastic becomes more brittle.

Fisheries committee  With the margins we're looking at this fall with the rising fuel costs and everything else, I don't want to lose a single trap.

Fisheries committee  Yes. I was retrieving the end with the whalesafe gear on it. Whether it is a plastic weak link or a nylon sleeve, when it comes out of the water and goes around the block—the pulley that's over the side of the boat before it gets to the hauler—that's where the majority of the failures occur.

Fisheries committee  Good afternoon, Mr. Chair. I'd like to thank you for having me. I've been involved in testing whalesafe gear throughout the summer in the most perfect conditions, which is not what we will be seeing this fall. I can honestly say that I've been able to break everything they have told me to test at well under the 1,700-pound breaking strength, with no consistency.