Quote:
Originally Posted by kane
Just out of curiosity, what was it that made you decide to leave that industry? I know two people who have worked fishing/crabbing boats and both of them stopped doing it because their bodies were broken down. One had a 40lbs box of frozen crab dropped on his back from 15 feet and the other blew out one knee once and the other knee twice. Did your body just give up or did you decide it was time to do something else?
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A lot of things. More than anything, the money isn't worth it or loses its luster when you end up spending 8 months or more with the same 5 people in the middle of the Bering Sea. it was something i was basically born doing and never really wanted to do.
Apart from the seasons, there is time in the shipyards where you also need to be there as well and its just draining. You wake up one day and have no clue where many years went. You can't really have a life and can't have relationships. I could probably count on one hand the number of people i know that fish full time like that who didn't end up coming home one day to find the wife had drained the accounts and ran off with someone.
I was never a fan of crabbing. Its a very hit and miss and the thing with crabbing is that its even more work when you're not catching anything. If you've watched Deadliest Catch (many of those guys are from Kodiak), you get what I mean. Setting pots, hauling pots, stacking pots on deck, running for 30 minutes, setting pots again etc etc etc. Whether they are full of crab or not, the work is brutal and money is hit and miss. You see and remember all the big paydays... but dont really see 1/2 the fleet that had a disappointing season. Typical crab pots weigh about 750 pounds empty and after pushing them around on deck a few 1000 times, with no sleep, little food and no money, everyone is basically exhausted and homicidal.
Fishing pollock is a bit different if you are delivering to a shore based plant, you are fishing maybe 24 hrs, then running to town for 24-48hrs to offload.. then back out for 24 hrs or whatever. If you are delivering to floating processors, then you might be on a schedule where you deliver every 18hrs or something, so basically you set the gear (the net) and just tow it until its time to deliver... usually transferring 200 tons at a time.
To my point about hard work and bettering ones self, i have not been to dutch harbor in a decade and STILL have people calling me to do one money season. 2 years ago, i was offered a job to fill in for someone for "A Season" which is when the fish are more valuable as they are filled with roe and could have made around 80k or so for 45 days work, but didn't go. It's just not worth it to me. But its testimony to the power of hard work, getting along with people, bettering yourself, learning as much as you can and always trying to out-work everyone around you.... There is always a huge demand to hard workers and talented people and those people always land on their feet.