Dr. Russell Brown was born in Farmingdale, New York and grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland. He earned his Bachelor’s in Fisheries and Wildlife from Cornell University and his Master’s degree and PhD. from Michigan State University. In 1994, Dr. Brown began working at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center on groundfish surveys. He also was involved with Atlantic salmon and was the Chief Scientific Adviser to the U.S. delegation to NASCO. As of this interview in 2016, he is the Population Dynamics Branch Chief at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center.

Tori Pilger is a marine biologist who worked as an observer for the Northeast Fisheries Science Center fishery monitoring Operations Branch. Pilger graduated from college with a degree in marine biology and moved to Texas before joining the observer program through East West Technical Services. Pilger trained in 2018 and spent three years as an observer, primarily on single-day trips on scalloping day boats due to chronic seasickness.