Author Archive

Posted on January 27, 2012 - by Morgan Howard

Alaska Fishermen Battle Icy Winter

The Coast Guard rescued 11 fishermen from two different vessles in less than 24 hours in extreme weather conditions Wednesday, January 24th including the FV Kimberly pictured above. The entire of state of Alaska has been experiencing brutal weather conditions this winter.  From record snowfalls in Valdez and Cordova to growing sea ice in the Bering Sea.  Now, the Deadliest Catch fleet is threatened by the approaching ice pack.

According to the Anchorage Daily News, “Sea ice is encroaching unusually early on the central Bering Sea, threatening to grind Alaska’s economically important snow crab fishery to a halt at the peak of the season, leaving crabbers facing major losses.

Earlier-than-expected ice is moving south over prime crabbing grounds, forcing boats away from their catch and putting millions of dollars of equipment in jeopardy.

These kind of “mother nature effects” are part of the fishing business everywhere, said Karen Gillis, the executive director of the Bering Sea Fishermen’s Association.

But this fishery, which was expected to net 80 million pounds this year, hasn’t seen a natural event like this in 20 years, she said, and it could have a devastating economic impact on crabbers and their families.”  Read much more on the story here.

According to Channel 2 news in Anchorage, “The NWS is fielding dozens of phone calls a day from crab fishermen, who are looking for an update on where the sea ice is at.

“Most people are picking their pots up and getting them out of harm’s way,” said Jim Stone, president of Alaska Bering Sea Crabbers.

Crab pots can cost over $1,000.

This year’s quota is 90 million pounds, which is a lot more than previous years.

Mid-January is the peak of the snow crab season in Alaska, but it opens in mid-October, and ends May 31.

Fishermen plan on waiting out the weather at local ports.

“A lot of wait and see, and realizing that things can change at any time,” Heather Fitch, the Dutch Harbor area biologist for the Alaska Department of Fish and Game said.”  Watch a video newscast of the story here.

Apparently, a person walking the docks in St. Paul Harbor looking for a deckhand job captured this video of the FV Northwestern entering the harbor recently.

 

Posted on November 25, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

Cornelia Marie Christmas

Here, at the Cornelia Marie family we believe in a few simple things. “Work hard, Play Hard” or “Work hard, play harder” if you prefer. We believe in a strong work ethic. Capt Phil said, “Everybody wants to be big time, they just don’t want to work for it.” If you are of able and there is a job to be done – do it. We were brought up to believe – “The sooner we finish, the sooner we can rest”, so let’s get to it.

We believe there is still a place in this world for a guy (or gal) who works hard, plays by the rules, uses common sense and has a little courage and a lot of heart. It’s okay if you’re good with your hands but lost behind a computer; or if you’d rather have mother nature as your boss instead of the guy in the next cubicle.

We’ve had some hard times in the Cornelia Marie family… but we know there’s still work to be done. When things get bad, good people come together and help out.  When things got really bad, we heard from thousands of good folks saying they were behind us and supporting us. The Cornelia Marie family thanks everyone who reached out to wish us well and offer support.  We know for every hard working Bering Sea Crabber, there are countless hard working Americans doing the jobs that make our lives better.  The Cornelia Marie family thanks you.

The FV Cornelia Marie sat out this year’s Red King Crab opening. We were in the shipyard in Ketchikan, Alaska while the rest of the fleet braved early winter storms. Our boat is back in it’s home port; Kodiak, Alaska. Capt. Tony Lara and deckhand Jake Jolibois have been busy getting the boat in the best shape possible. Jake has been a great addition to our team. You may recognize him from the many years he fished on the FV Kodiak with Capt. Wild Bill. He is a good guy with a great family (Valerie & Colleen).

Recently, Jake replaced some of the deck boards on the Cornelia Marie. Some of the boards have probably been on the boat since it was built years ago. Those deck boards have been shipped off to a master wood worker here in Washington state. He is currently in the process of building custom wooden pens with the inscription “FV CORNELIA MARIE“. This is awesome (and expensive) hard wood like Purpleheart, Teak and Lignum Vitae. This wood survived the Bering Sea and now I’m excited to turn them into something we can share with others. We hope to offer these unique custom pens for sale soon. We donated one of the prototypes to charity and the other is in the hands of Josh Harris.  We are also working on a book and video, but more on that later.

We’ve been asked for years to sell pictures of the FV Cornelia Marie.  So, for this Christmas I’ve decided to give everyone who orders something from our online store, a free picture of the FV Cornelia Marie.  And just for fun, our merchandise vendor Print Mojo will randomly select a half dozen orders to add in an autographed photo as well.  The images are signed by Capt. Tony Lara, Josh Harris and deckhand Dale Pruitt.

If you visit our online store, you can see that it’s filled with pictures of our supporters in CM gear.  We don’t have any professional models, just our crew, family, friends and fans.  It means a lot to us that somebody wants to wear the CM mark, the same one that graces the bow of the Cornelia Marie.  Keep sending in the pictures and I’ll try to get them up in the store or share them online somewhere.  You can email them to me at morgan at corneliamarie dot com or just go to our contact page.

Big things are in store for the Cornelia Marie.  It’s been rough seas for the past two years, but now we see calmer waters ahead.  I hope you all can hang on for the ride… with a little hard work things will work out.  Work hard… play hard.

 

Posted on October 7, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

Cornelia Marie in shipyard

As the Deadliest Catch boats prepare for the October 15th King Crab opening, the Cornelia Marie sits in dry dock.  The CM has been in dry dock at Ketchikan, Alaska for a few weeks and will likely be there for a couple more.  We are simply performing maintenance and taking care of some issues.  In fact, I just spoke with Dave Mahler, the naval architect and marine engineer who did the extension work on the CM in 1995.  He spoke about how the CM is a good, seaworthy vessel.  We talked about the unique design of the CM with its two tunnels along the side of the boat connecting the engine room with the forepeak.  The FV Cornelia Marie was built specifically for the rough seas of Alaska and performs as well as any boat out there.  Once it’s all painted and looking good, I will post some pictures.

So where is the CM crew?  Capt. Tony Lara is working the Cornelia Marie while in dry dock.  Tony will take the boat back to Kodiak for more work once the shipyard is finished with her.  Capt. Tony has been a big help to the CM family, we couldn’t do this work without his guidance.  Jake and Josh will be fishing the King Crab opening, just not on the CM.  They are fishermen and like the rest of us, need to work to make money.  They are both going to be deckhands  on different boats for this year’s opening.  Thanks to some good friends in the fleet, they both have jobs this season.  I believe Ryan Simpson is now working on the FV Incentive.  Dale Pruitt is currently fish Cod out of Kodiak.  Troy “Chief” Huls will continue to work on the Columbia River.

The quota for King Crab this year was cut in half.  We all knew the quota would be cut but didn’t think it would be this deep.  Hopefully, the price is up and the fellas catch them quickly with no injuries.  However, there is some good news… the snow crab harvest nearly doubled.  The fleet usually starts fishing for Opilios mid January.  The Cornelia Marie is a fishing boat and a damn good one… so we’ll be back stronger than ever!  Thank you to everyone who supports us and sticks by us!  We really appreciate it!

Posted on July 26, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

Future of the Cornelia Marie

 

Season 7 of Deadliest Catch has concluded.  The FV Cornelia Marie has been featured on the Discovery Channel show for six years in a row.  Since the passing of our skipper Capt. Phil Harris, the future of the Cornelia Marie as it appears on television has been uncertain.

There’s a good chance that our boat won’t be back on “Deadliest Catch” any more.  However, we know there is still a lot of interest in following the Cornelia Marie.  If it was up to me, I would continue to let you all in on the adventures of the Cornelia Marie and maybe even give you a chance to participate.  (Folks in LA have talked to us about doing our television show.)

It’s the intent of Jake and Josh to continue fishing and fulfill their father’s legacy.  So, I know they will continue to do that and I’m sure you will be able to follow them as they do.

I wish I had more answers for you but I don’t at this time.  I apologize for appearing cryptic, that is not my intention.  I know there are many questions about what’s next so I didn’t want to ignore everyone.  I do appreciate everyone’s well wishes and support of the CM family.  The people who follow us are really some of the best people I have ever met.

Posted on June 18, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

New Cornelia Marie Crew heads to Bristol Bay

Yesterday, the FV Cornelia Marie (CM) cast its lines for the Bering Sea or Bristol Bay to be more exact.  The CM is a working boat. It works year round in multiple fishing industries.  You see it on the Deadliest Catch fishing for King and Opilio crab during the fall and winter.  During the summers, when the cameras are not on board, the CM stays busy tendering for herring and salmon.

The CM will travel about four days nonstop from its home port in Kodiak to the salmon fishing grounds in Bristol Bay.  On board is a crew of four.  The Skipper is Jerry Meals and the deckhands are Cameron Meals, Brandon Mathis, Cliff McMachen and my brother Keith Howard.

Keith and I, along with our other brothers Ron and Eric have all fished on the family boats.  Currently, Eric is salmon seining in Southeast Alaska on board the “Spicy Lady”.  This boat calls Petersburg its home port and is owned by Collin Martens.  S.E. Alaska is predicted to have good salmon runs this year and I hope my brother Eric knocks ‘em dead.

Last year, our mother, Cornelia Devlin experienced the most difficult time with the FV Cornelia Marie.  This year has been a rebuilding year and we look forward to many good times to come.

Posted on June 7, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

New CM Capt. & Crew for Opies

Deadliest Catch airs tonight on Discovery Channel.  Tonight will be the first show for the Opilio crab season.  The FV Cornelia Marie Blue Crab season ended in a most unexpected way which resulted with our skipper Derrick Ray parting ways with the FV Cornelia Marie.  As a follower of this website, you learned from an earlier blog that we have a new captain and crew members for the Opilio crab season.  Captain Tony Lara replaces Derrick Ray in the wheelhouse.  Engineer Troy Huls replaces Steve Wared.  Lifelong Kodiak fisherman, Dale Pruitt replaces Freddie Maughtai.  We will see an emotional goodbye to Freddie tonight.  There has been much controversy about how the Blue Crab season ended.  New skipper Tony Lara attempts to put some closure on that situation so we can move forward with a new season of fishing.  Tony writes this from his Facebook page:

Crabbing is a tough job in a harsh environment and the ocean has no feelings. It is oblivious to our existence and therefore shows no mercy. As a fisherman, a guy can spend 12 hours doing a grid, looking for a friend in the debris field from a sunken vessel. When they call the search off, there is no pause for mourning. You just look at the plotter and its 20 miles to the next string. When we hit the beach, we ring a bell, drink a beer and move on. I know, it sucks but that is who we are. Crabbers don’t care if they’re pretty, they don’t have refined social skills and they don’t have time to put up with weakness. There is a fine line between confidence and arrogance so often times we come off like assholes, or in my case, a whole ass (Why do something halfway?).
The past season on the Cornelia Marie has certainly created some discussion and polarized people into two different camps. 30 Years ago, Derrick started working on deck for Ralph Collins, Cornelia’s ex-husband. The first boat he ran was one of Ralph and Cornelia’s. There were issues on the boat that could not be ignored and had to be addressed. Often times, it’s not what you say but how you say it. What Derrick lacks in social skills, he more than makes up as a fisherman. Yes, a guy is only as good as his last delivery but during the derby days of crabbing, Derrick consistently caught more crab than anyone else, including Phil. Give the guy a good platform and enough time to fish and he will catch crab.
I have known the Harris brothers for over 20 years. They grew up with me on the boat. I gave Josh his first job on the boat when he was 15. I hired Carl and Millman and Freddy. My advantage over Derrick is I had already earned the crew’s respect so it didn’t matter what came up in the pots. I hauled a lot of blanks working for Phil, too. That’s part of the game. Blanks are good information.
Josh has stepped up and taken on a lot of responsibility but still needs to learn to focus on what’s really important. Jake has the potential to be a good fisherman but needs to address some personal issues first. I want to see these boys succeed and will do what I can to help them, but remember; this is a tough business so coddling them is not an option.
The new season is about to start, bringing an end to the last chapter. Let’s all close the book and move on.

Thank you
Tony Lara

Posted on June 5, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

business of fishing on Deadliest Catch

Deadliest Catch has informed the world about commercial fishing in Alaska.  However, the show does distort the industry if one doesn’t understand the full context of the fishing business.

I read an article last week entitled, “Deadliest Catch’s captivating tale of addiction” by Matt Zoller Seitz of salon.com.  Mr. Seitz is a good writer.  He wrote a good article about Capt. Phil’s passing last year that I remembered well.  However, he definitely gets a few facts incorrect in this one.  He seems to know about crab fishing outside of the television show, “Deadliest Catch”, but I do wonder what the source of his information is… I hope it’s not just the internet.

I will take one of the Mr. Seitz’s paragraphs and provide some corrections and context.  Of course, the information below is not without exceptions and is based on personal experience.

Mr. Seitz writes, “The crew members make most of their yearly nut between October and January, often within the span of a few weeks, and are so exhausted afterward that it could be weeks or months before they’re able to do comparably physical work.”

Most Alaska fishermen work year round in multiple fisheries.  I would say most of them make more money fishing Opilios in the months of January through March than the King Crab season between October and January.  Also, some crab fishing deckhands own salmon permits and make more money in this fishery during the summer.

The second part of the sentence is odd.  The fishermen will go back to work immediately if there is work to be done.  In fact, our current engineer Troy Hulis is quoted as saying that he once worked a 40 month stretch with only a total of 20 days off (about three weeks in more than three years.)  Now granted, they probably weren’t all physically demanding but I am sure many of them were as these years were most likely during the “derby” days of crab fishing and longlining.

Mr. Seitz writes, “Anyone who pauses for longer than a few minutes for any reason is instantly suspected of being a slacker who’s going to shrink both the season’s haul and the size of each man’s share.“  A deckhand who is not carrying his weight (slacker) doesn’t shrink the season’s haul and the size of each man’s share.

Every boat has an allotted quota of crab to catch which doesn’t change.  The gross revenue of the fishing season is pre-determined, it’s just the costs that are unknown.  It’s true that the faster they can catch their quota, the fewer the costs they will incur.  Therefore, more money falls to the bottom line.  However, there’s a good chance the rest of the crew will just work harder and cover up for the “slacker” deckhand.  The captain and crew can actually take away from a deckhand’s crew share if he’s not carrying his weight.  Therefore, the crew shares may actually increase for the rest of the crew to compensate them for the additional work.

Mr. Seitz writes, “(Not that any of these guys are making a king’s ransom. According to figures at the end of last night’s show, the average haul is somewhere between $30-$60K, which isn’t much once you subtract taxes and Social Security.)” Mr. Seitz is actually right on with this one but doesn’t go far enough.  Those figures on the show are very misleading and I’m not sure where they get them.  It appears they take the total pounds times the selling price and determine the gross revenue for the fishing boat. Then they probably take 10% of that figure to estimate the crew share.  However, they most likely are not subtracting the expenses of fuel, groceries, and personal gear which is taken off the top before the crew gets paid.  Then of course, as Mr. Seitz states, every crew member has to pay taxes on that amount.

I realized after reading this article that writers have been getting the facts wrong about the fishing industry since the beginning of the series.  However, I can’t recall one article in the main stream press that went about addressing all of those mistakes.   Maybe I’ll try and take on that task but maybe not… writing is harder than fishing.

Posted on May 26, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

Capt. Derrick and Josh speak up

Since Discovery Channel aired the episode entitled, “Thick as Thieves” on May 24th, we have been inundated with a lot of opinions about who is right and wrong between Capt. Derrick, Jake and Josh.  This latest article by ew.com provides both sides equal time in answering all the questions that you may have. -Morgan  (I will delete any comment that uses profanity, hate speech or threatens violence.  My children like to check out this website, too.)

EW.com article by by Mandi Bierly

The game of he said/he said may be over on Deadliest Catch now that Capt. Derrick Ray is no longer skipper of the Cornelia Marie, but it’s ongoing on land where Ray and Josh Harris continue to express different opinions about why their king crab season ended abruptly. Last week, fans watched as the crew of the Cornelia Marie – which Josh and his fellow deckhand brother Jake are now part owners of — told Ray they were done fishing for the elusive blue crab that he couldn’t seem to find. On Tuesday’s episode, they saw Ray, who was for days convinced he smelled marijuana on recovering addict Jake, search for and find pot paraphernalia in the engine room. He phoned the authorities and had a cop waiting on the dock to question Jake — who insisted to the captain he wasn’t smoking weed. Instead of speaking to the cop there, Jake walked off the boat and headed straight to the airport with no bags, just whatever he had in his pockets. The cop caught up to Jake in the terminal, but without any evidence that the paraphernalia belonged to him, he could not force him to take a blood test. Jake refused a blood test because, he said, he shouldn’t have to prove himself again after having already passed two urine tests.

Ray tells EW he heard that Jake bragged to crew members about having used fake urine, and as a captain who could be held legally responsible for zero tolerance drug violations on the vessel, he wanted a definitive answer. EW was unable to reach Jake Harris for comment on Ray’s claim. Josh Harris told us he doesn’t know anything about that, but offered a guess at why his brother, who, again, maintained he was clean, would bolt: “I think he just didn’t want to deal with the hostility,” Josh says. “I mean the guy was constantly attacking us. Jake’s not quite as strong as me. I don’t mind people attacking me verbally. You can only deal with somebody for so long when you’re in close quarters and they’re not willing to listen to anything. You kinda gotta just get out of the situation before it escalates into a worse deal.” The cop was given permission to search Jake’s quarters on the Cornelia Marie and came up empty-handed.

That was the last day that Ray saw Jake. He says he last saw Josh three days later when they tied the boat up, shook hands, and pretended they might see each other again come opilio crab season, which started last January. Recalls Ray, “I said, ‘Well, maybe I’ll see you for Opis,’ and he said, ‘Maybe so.’ And then I went and sat down with [majority boat owner Cornelia Marie Devlin], and she said, ‘You know, it didn’t go well.’ I said, ‘I know that.’ She said, ‘Basically, the boys just don’t think they can work with you again. They don’t want you back.’ And I said, ‘That’s fine, Cornelia.’ In my heart of hearts, they didn’t have enough money to pay me to come back.’” So what went so wrong?

After talking with Derrick and Josh, here’s what we know: Both men agree that Derrick was brought on as skipper following the death of the boys’ father, Capt. Phil Harris, to catch crab and continue to teach them how to fish — and both men agree that he was unable to do that. First, Derrick’s theory why: “I have a 30-year history with Cornelia. The first boat I ever ran in the Bering Sea 26 years ago was owned by her and her ex-husband. So I was there for Cornelia and a very dear friend, Phil, who was a fishing partner for 15 years. I really thought we were goin’ to go crab fishin’. Once it all started, then I understood. [Josh and Jake] thought they were producin’ the show,” he says. “That’s the deal. Neither one of them wants to be a fisherman. After about three or four days, I knew what I was up against.” It was on Day 3, Derrick claims, that Josh came up to the wheelhouse and told him, “We’re not here to catch crab, we’re here to make TV and when we’ve made enough TV, we’re going home.” Derrick insists he’d take a polygraph on that. Derrick says once he believed he smelled weed on Jake at sea (we saw him politely refuse to let Jake take the wheel because of it) and thought Josh’s priority wasn’t filling the tank, he didn’t want to teach them. “I was hoping that those guys would listen to me, but once I saw that they didn’t care, that it wasn’t about fishing with them, I didn’t care anymore,” Derrick says. “Why am I gonna share my life and my wealth of information with you? That’s when I’d given up. I could care less.”

Josh tells a different tale. He says the crew quit on Derrick because he created a hostile environment, they were tired of pulling empty pots and didn’t trust that he could find the crab, and the boat had already gone over budget on fuel.

“He claimed to be my dad’s friend and was supposed to teach us how to fish — teach us the right way, the wrong way, pick up where my dad left off. Instead, he’s out there bashing my dad and telling us how he did such a great injustice to us and we don’t know anything. In reality though, his numbers were off on fuel and he didn’t catch us crab. I think he’s bitter because he couldn’t do his job, so he’s just tryin’ to come up with any excuse in the book to try to push blame off on to somebody else,” Josh says. ”And as for this, we’re goin out and we’re just gonna be TV stars bulls—, that’s a guy that’s just trying to take any stab at us that he can. Obviously we’re out there to work. If we were out there to make a TV show, then I suppose we would have kept going and let the charade f—ing continue. We were trying to make money and keep the boat going. We’re not made of money. And unfortunately, he couldn’t find the crab. He wasn’t as good as he thought he was. He’s a legend in his own mind, in my opinion. We s—canned the guy, and so he’s still pissed off. He didn’t put on his big boy pants, like he always told me. I’ve seen a lot of excuses come out of a lot people, but he still won’t admit that he’s the one who couldn’t just catch the crab. Had we caught crab, things probably would have been different.”

Fans may be wondering why they’d choose to go after the blue crab — they’re worth more than red crab, but they’re also notorious for giving even the best fishermen the runaround. The Cornelia Marie had leased out its quota because Cornelia and the boys weren’t sure they’d be able to get the boat fishing, and Derrick was able to lease other fishermen’s quota on his reputation. It was then a collective decision to give blue crab a whirl, Josh says. “We knew that the guys in the past hadn’t done that well, but he was sure that he could catch them. He said he’s the best blue crab fisherman there ever was. All that BS. We set a budget, we went out and did it, we exceeded the budget, and luckily, it wasn’t that long a time. The Cornelia Marie is a lot bigger than the other boats that are out there, and it burns a lot more fuel. We just didn’t have the money to continue going. In my opinion, the man wanted to go out and prove something to himself versus help us out. He’s a very cocky and arrogant man.” Ray’s response: “But we really only pulled pots for five days. There isn’t a crab fisherman on the planet who in five days can make a season. There was no time to fish. They gave up.” He concedes he’s arrogant — when he’s on a boat. “I stand by what I said and what I did…. Three hours after my dad’s funeral, I was back out on the ocean crab fishing. I wasn’t even running my own boat. You either do the job or you don’t. If you want to be a fisherman, you fish. If you can’t and you’re worried about something else, then you stay on the dock. It’s a big boy world,” he says. “It’s not a hard job once you learn how to do it, but when you step foot on one of those boats, some of us have a huge, huge ego. And when I step foot on one, I turn that ego on. And when I get on the beach, I turn it off. That’s what you have to learn to do if you want to be a good human being. You can’t carry that crap off the ocean to land. Otherwise, you’ll be a complete jacka–.”

Where do the men stand now? The Cornelia Marie did go back out for Opi season under a new captain, who we’ll meet on the June 7 episode of Deadliest Catch. “I think the CM fans will be very pleased with the situation. Good things will happen,” Josh laughs. “The boat is still floating. We’re upright and breathing. And I still got all my fingers and toes, so everything’s going pretty good.” Both Harris brothers will start captain’s school the second week of June, Josh says. So the Cornelia Marie will be back if there’s a Season 8 of Deadliest Catch? “You better believe it. That’s the plan right now,” he says.

Derrick, meanwhile, says he left the show thinking he will probably never return to the Bering Sea. He’d been gone for five years before taking Phil’s chair. “I’m tired. To see that, that was enough for me,” he says. “It made me appreciate what I’ve had all these years and the adventure.” He is, however, a part of the Bering Sea Crab Fishermen’s Tour that operates out of Ketchikan, Alaska on the Aleutian Ballad (a familiar name to fans who watched season 2 of Deadliest Catch). “There are days when 80 percent of the people on our tour watch Deadliest Catch. Deadliest Catch is our friend. We don’t ever diss Deadliest Catch or anybody involved on our tour,” he says, with a laugh. “That’s not what it’s about. It’s about a lot more than that. Every day we get to share our lives with people. We have people laughin’ and cryin’. We fill in the blanks for ‘em. They want to know if guys really do the pranks out there. And I tell them, ‘Well, some of them, but not all of them.’ Do guys really stay up for 40 hours at a time all the time? I say, ‘No. It’s not the reality of it.’ The deal is, there ain’t nobody out there with an S on their chest. It’s a job that’s learned by young men that are fortunate enough to have the ability to do hardcore blue-collar work and make good money. I’ve seen all this stuff printed that crab fishermen are heroes or legends. Heroes are firemen that go into burning buildings, our school teachers who get up and teach our kids every day, our 19-year-old kids we send halfway around the world that get their legs blown off. Legends are great presidents. Einstein, there’s a legend. The only thing crab fishermen are is legends in their own frickin’ minds.”

Posted on May 2, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

Fishermen’s Memorial includes Capt. Phil

Every year on the first Sunday of May, the Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial has a service to honor those who were lost at sea.

Yesterday, the Cornelia Marie family attended the service to honor Capt. Phil.  I attended, along with my mother Cornelia and her husband Hugh.  Josh was there, along with his grandfather Grant and good family friends Russ, Dave and Dan.  The service was good and included a reading of the names and ringing the ship’s bell for each name.

After the service was over, we looked at the new addition of names added to this beautiful memorial.  The photograph above is my mother, Cornelia Devlin touching Phil’s name.  They were friends and business partners for nearly 20 years.

I also want to notice Capt. Robert Royer, the skipper of the F/V Northern Belle which sank April 20, 2010.  Capt. Royer and I share a good mutual friend in Gino D’Cafango.

I appreciate the work of the Seattle Fishermen’s Memorial Board, including Janet Little and Brooke Strommen.  Also, on the board and in attendance yesterday was Capt. Keith Colburn from the FV Wizard.

The board is dedicated to promoting safety in the fishing fleets and easing the burden of the families and friends of fishermen/women who have lost their lives at sea.  If you would like to learn more, please visit seattlefishermensmemorial.org.  If you would like to make a contribution to the Board’s ongoing efforts, please contact them through the website or call 206-782-6577.

Posted on April 21, 2011 - by Morgan Howard

Deadliest Catch, Season 7 Rolls On

We have now seen the first two episodes of Season 7′s “Deadliest Catch”, including the two hour premiere episode on April 12th.  The LA Times wrote that the first episode was the “top-rated prime-time show on cable” for the night.

I read a lot of the television reviews of the “Deadliest Catch”, both from professional news sites and amateur blogs. So, if you’ve written a blog about the Cornelia Marie, there’s a good chance I’ve read it.

The reviews are generally very positive for the new season, with a few consistent comments coming from most writers. The first two most read comments are “The show is not the same without Capt. Phil” and “The new Capt. is not working”. Mandi Bierly from EW.com addresses both of these points with her review:

“We’re now three hours into season 7 of Discovery’s Deadliest Catch, and I’m officially missing the late Capt. Phil Harris. After last season — the final half of which was so moving it made viewers feel sorry for people who weren’t tuning in — it was hard to look at this series as just a TV show. That’s a fact I know to be true. When I joined Time Bandit captain Johnathan Hillstrand in New York last week to live blog the season premiere with his brother Andy and Northwestern captain Sig Hansen, John told me he was afraid new Cornelia Marie captain Derrick Ray would come off as a villain when really, he’s just doing what he needs to do to keep that boat afloat and the boys in line.”

Ms. Bierly goes on to write a good review if you need to catch up with what’s happened so far this season.  Read here.

One of the most unusual, and humorous reviews came from this blog.  The author is an Alaskan fisherman from Kodiak.  His writing tends to wander, but he also noticed another widely commented remark, “Where is Wild Bill and the FV Kodiak?”

“Wild Bill was noticeably absent from the show and he might be the “character” I get the biggest kick out of. And where is the chew? Do all these mudderphutters smoke over spit? Almost everyone I knows in the biz is Copenhagen powered. That’s not an endorsement by the way. You should see my dipping ladies in Dillingham.”

Finally, the biggest surprise so far this season hasn’t come from the show!  We just discovered the song “Ode to Phil”, written and performed by none other than Capt. Andy from the “FV Time Bandit”.  Thank you Andy for a beautiful song.  You can download the song from itunes here.  Capt. Andy talked about the song in a recent Zap2it article.

“I wrote two songs,” he tells Zap2it. “The night after Phil died on the show, I was feeling weird. I went to sleep, and I woke up, had it all in my head. I wrote an ‘Ode to Phil’ and ‘Fishing Man’s Life.’ I just woke up, and I had all the words in my head.”

Hillstrand hopes to get the chance to perform “Fishing Man’s Life” on the “Deadliest Catch’s” companion-roundtable show, “After the Catch,” which starts later in the season, and to have “Ode to Phil” available on iTunes

“I’m not that great of a singer,” he says, “but when you hear the words and you hear the guitar playing, then you hear what I say … I would tell you if it’s a bad song, but they’re really good songs. One, I’m just saying goodbye to my buddy; and the other one just talks about kicking ass and fishing.”