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Theirs is one of the deadliest occupations, with 800-pound crab pots menacing life and limb, and stormy waters threatening their ships.

But the men and women who ply the Bering Sea pursuing the lucrative catch are facing a different challenge: The three-month Alaska crab season starts Tuesday, but government workers, idled by the federal shutdown, aren’t issuing the necessary permits.

The shutdown has forced furloughs of fisheries managers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Juneau. Without them, some 80 boats that fish for Bristol Bay red king crab, Bering Sea snow crab and other species can’t get the paperwork to catch their quotas.

About 50 of the vessels are based in Seattle and 10 others are from Oregon. Most of the boats are gearing up in the Aleutian Islands or are en route.

The biggest financial threat from a lengthy delay is missing the New Year’s holiday season in Japan, where half of Alaska king crab is sold. That could depress prices by 20 percent or more in Japan and drag down domestic crab prices as well, said Jake Jacobsen, director of Seattle-based Inter-Cooperative Exchange, a group of Bering Sea crab fishermen.

King crabs are expected to fetch around $16 a pound wholesale this year. They can sell for $40 a pound retail. With the total allowable catch for Bristol Bay red king crab set at 8.6 million pounds for the 2013-14 season, every dollar drop in price would result in millions of dollars of lost revenue.

The total quota for smaller and cheaper Bering Sea snow crab is nearly 54 million pounds; for Bering Sea Tanner crab, it’s 3.1 million pounds.

The economic stakes — more than $200 million to the harvesters alone — prompted U.S. Rep. Suzan DelBene, D-Medina, to take to the House floor last Saturday to urge Republicans to end the government shutdown.

“We are facing a ‘fishing cliff’ in the Bering Sea unless Congress acts,” she warned.

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