Fishing remains among the United States' deadliest occupations, according to a report the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics released yesterday.
Fishermen recorded the highest occupational fatality rate of 111.8 per 100,000 workers last year, followed by loggers at 86.4, pilots and flight engineers at 66.7 and structural iron and steel workers at 45.5.
There were 39 commercial fishing and hunting deaths in 2007, down from 51 deaths in 2006.
Fishing-related fatalities represented less than 1 percent of last year's 5,488 total occupational fatalities, down 6 percent from the previous year. Last year's U.S. occupational fatality rate of 3.7 per 100,000 workers was the lowest ever since the BLS began collecting such statistics in 1992.
Nearly half of all occupational fatalities in 2007 involved workers in transportation or construction industries.
