1978 ❖ ONE-HUNDRED TWENTY-TWO FEET OF FISHING BOAT

Two-million dollar boat
Headed to drydock at 
Marine Construction & Design Co.
Seattle, WA.
June 1978.
Click image to enlarge.
Original gelatin-silver photograph
from the Saltwater People Historical Society.
by Cole Porter.

One sign of a boom in the fishing industry was recorded here and across the nation in rising orders for expensive fishing boats.
        Higher seafood prices have encouraged fishermen to buy new equipment to harvest the traditional seafood of the United States market, crab, salmon, and tuna.
        Puget Sound shipyards reported large backlogs of orders for vessels, which typically are 100 to 130-feet and cost about $2 million.
        Peter Schmidt, president of a Seattle firm, the Marine Construction & Design Co (MARCO) told of "delivering a boat every 45 days. The entire industry has accelerated its production."
        "There's a big spurt in fishing-vessel construction, most of which is destined for the Gulf of Alaska and Bering Sea," said Robert Balkovic, chief of fisheries development for the National Marine Fisheries Service, in Seattle. They calculated that there was about a two-year backlog of boat orders for Alaska, he said.
        The Martinac Shipbuilding Corp., of Tacoma, reports it has a 31/2 -year backlog on its $6 million tuna boats.
        These bottom fish are found in the North Pacific, making Seattle a likely capital of the emerging industry.
        The domestic industry is pretty much on the verge of getting involved in the bottom fish of the North Pacific and Bering Sea said Mike Grabel, chief of financial assistance for the National Marine Fisheries Service, in Washington, D.C. " It's one of the nation's major fishing resources."
         Domestic entry into the bottom fish market would not have been feasible without the year-old 200-miles fishing limit. Foreign fishing fleets, notably from Russia and Japan, have trawled the waters of the West Coast, frequently overfishing.
        The new limit allows the United States to control fishing in this region, which amounts to about 20 percent of the world's best fishing, Balkovic said.
        Overfishing has ended because of US regulation, but hardly a dent has been made by domestic fishermen into the bottom fish market.
        United States fishermen will begin to shift to bottom fishing as it becomes more profitable, Balkovic said.
        While most new boats are being designed for crabbing, where the money is now, Balkovic said he expects many of those boats to be converted eventually to trawling for bottom fish.
        Foreign fishermen still take 200 million to 400 million pounds of fish a year from the US waters.

Words by Peter Rinearson for the Seattle Times. 1978.