antarctic

The height of the fishing numbers seems to be better on a vessel half that size....or mayby I just should buy myself a pair of glasses..LOL..

Ole..

Don't get me wrong but having seen many photos of the older fishing vessels ones like this one must be pure luxury.

I fully understand that it is still a tough way to make a living but at least the modern gear and facilities here must make it a bit more bearable.

She's the old Pathway or Lunar Bow, built 1995 and then sold to Iceland about 2000.Eamon McHugh sold the 60 metre antarctic to Norway this time last year and bought this boat last September.Shes more in line with the quotas they have,now that they have to pay attention to such things.

I think she's the old Lunar Bow as the present one was built in 2000 and she's being replaced with a new 68m boat to be ready for 2008 ( hold up is the Engines , the manufacturer is running flat out to complete orders and can't keep up !!! )

Davie

Yes Derek the modern boats mean a lot less physical work for the crew , a lot safer working environment but less jobs overall. The Herring drifters used to be numbered in their thousands in the 1930's but there are only 25 or so large Pelagic fishing vessels left in the fleet. The difference is that each of the new vessels like this one can catch in one haul more than a single drifter could take in several years. The 25 pelagic vessels in the UK fleet have quotas of around 100,000 tonnes of Mackerel and 40,000 tonnes of Herring to catch every year and they catch all of that quota in no more than 12 weeks fishing time.

So instead of 1500 90ft long Drifters each with 10 men aboard ( with all the onshore jobs that needed to be there to service the fleet , around 4 people onshore for every 1 at sea ) we have 25 boats with 16 men-18 men.

Davie

The loss of jobs is always sad Davie and I guess there are the sons of generations of fishermen who had a reasonable expectation of following the family tradition into the job, and they had their hopes dashed.

There always seems to be a downside of progress somewhere.

this boat passed us yesterday steaming south while we were hauling our gear off rona she was fairly going along

ex LUNAR BOW PD265 ex ASGRIMUR HALLDORSSON SF25O

Yes Derek and we're seeing the same thng happening now too. The present white fish fleet is only 30% of its size 6 years ago and the prawn fleet 60% its size due to EU driven reductions in fishing effort. We've lost hundreds of boats since 1999 again with thousands of jobs lost. Some boats that were scrapped in 2004 were only 4-5 years old.

20 years ago there was 120 prawn boats , 40 whitefish boats and 35 pelagic pursers just in Fraserburgh ( around 1400 jobs at sea with another 5 to 6000 jobs onshore to support the fleet [ that counts chandlers , fuel suppliers , processors , shops , car dealerships , etc ] ) and now we're down to 14 Pelagic trawlers , 8 whitefish boats and 60 prawn boats ( 600 jobs offshore and around 2500-3000 onshore jobs ) and thats in just 6 years.

We used to have a thriving town center now there are only 5 shops open and there are more charity shops and betting shops that anything else. The young of the town drink alchohol far younger and in greater quanities than they did 20 years ago and there is a fairly serious drug problem up here now too mostly due to the drastically lower levels of wages compared to previous years. We also have a lot of migrant workers in the processing ( and onboard the boats ) industry mosty eastern european or Portugese/Spanish simply due to the locals not wanting to work in anything to do with the fishing industry due to the uncertainty of keeping your job.