Lerøy has been hit by a new salmon escape incident

There were more problems for Lerøy Seafood Group today as the company struggled with a severe salmon run.

An estimated 14,000 fish are feared to have escaped from a Lerøy Midt facility in Hitra municipality.

The fish have an average weight of around seven kilos.

The company said it quickly managed to deploy additional resources to secure the site and recover as many escaped fish as possible.

Harald Larssen, managing director of Lerøy Midt, said: “We are having a good dialogue with the authorities, including the Fisheries Directorate, and are working closely with them to manage the situation as efficiently as possible.”

Lerøy Midt has an emergency plan that it says it was able to put into action. This also included the deployment of recapture nets, of which more are still in use today.

Larssen added: The company deeply regrets the incident.

He said: “This shouldn’t happen. We have the vision of Zero Escapes and take it very seriously.

“Lerøy has its own environmental and safety group, which has now started to investigate the cause of the escape. Our priority now is to limit the extent of the damage and learn from the incident to avoid future escape attempts.”

It has been a challenging few months for the Lerøy Group, which included an outbreak of 5,000 fish at a site in Lerøy Midt in February and the loss of fish due to water quality issues and listeria issues.