830 TONNES FOR 40 DAYS OF FOUL WEATHER

‘The weather has been foul the whole time, not least during the steam home. We got through the storm yesterday that the Norwegians named Ole, and we had wind speeds of 40 m/sec for four hours. When the wind dropped away to 25 m/sec, the sea started to build up. Now we’re steaming into the wind instead of setting a direct course for home,’ said Ægir Franzson, skipper of Therney RE when we spoke to him this evening.

Therney is steaming home to Reykjavík from the Norwegian zone of the Barents Sea and is expected to dock on Wednesday. A trip of 40 days behind it and a catch of 830 tonnes ungutted weight.

According to Ægir Franzson, this trip has been a tale of unrelenting bad weather, even though the Barents Sea can frequently be calm with fine weather at this time of year.

‘Fishing was reasonable, with steady catches, buy we heard from the Norwegian and Faroese skippers we were alongside that they aren’t used to seeing these conditions in the Norwegian area of the Barents Sea at this time of year. We were mostly on the Fugløy Bank and eastwards from there on the line to Nord Kapp. As well as the Norwegians and the Faroese, there were many Russian trawlers fishing these same grounds,’ he said.

As can be expected, Therney’s catch is mainly cod, plus approximately 200 tonnes of haddock.