HB Grandi: Great to be back on the job

HB Grandi's purse seiner Víkingur AK is now steaming to Vopnafjördur with a full load of 1400 tonnes of capelin on board, reports www.megafishnet.com with reference to HB Grandi.

The fish were caught over two days south-west of Malarrif on the Snæfellsnes peninsula. According to skipper Magnús Thorvaldsson, this is Víkingur's first full trip of the season after the decision was taken last week to bring the ship out of mothballs to help catch enough capelin to use as much as possible for roe extraction.

Skipper Magnús Thorvaldsson has plenty of experience behind him and was asked to skipper Víkingur if the situation should arise that the ship might be needed to increase fishing capacity temporarily. He was last at sea when Víkingur was used to transport mackerel two years ago with two trips to the Faroes and one to Vopnafjördur.

‘It's great to be back on the job again, even though it's been blowing hard the whole time since we sailed a week ago,' he said when we spoke to him yesterday. Speaking to the skipper was less than easy, as the first time we called he was preparing to shoot and the second time the bag was on Víkingur's side and the fish were being pumped out in bad weather. This was complete at around 1700 yesterday and with the decision taken to land the fish in Vopnafjördur, it was also decided that the southern route around Iceland should be taken.

‘It's been a bit of a battle since we sailed. We've been fishing on small patches of fish and the weather hasn't helped. Today was the first time that the capelin boats have been getting good shots and we filled up with a 400 tonne bag taken 12 nautical miles south-west of Malarrif. That's our first full trip, but we had already landed a couple of smaller trips to Akranes.'

‘What's today? Wednesday?' he asked when we enquired when he expected to be in Vopnafjördur. ‘Friday looks likely, but we'll have to see how it goes," he said.