Pearlside search off south coast

Fishing has started on pearlside and two of HB Grandi's pelagic vessels, Faxi RE and Lundey NS, sailed last Saturday, reports www.megafishnet.com with reference to HB Grandi.

Catches have been slow so far for the first few days of the season, and bad weather made fishing difficult last night, according to Lundey's skipper Arnthor Hjorleifsson.

‘We can say that all our time so far has gone into finding pearlside in catchable amounts. Faxi had a 30 tonne tow on Sunday and they were shooting away again just now, although I hear the marks aren't anything special. There was a bit of ‘dust' on the sounders and we'll have to wait an see if it was anything to be had there,' Arnthór Hjörleifsson said when we spoke to him around midday on Tuesday when Lundey was in a position around 30 nautical miles south of Grindavík.

So far the search has taken them from the Grindavík Deeps west to the Skerja Deeps, and back again, after which skipper Arnthór Hjörleifsson expected to search further east along the southern coast if there is nothing to be found in the Grindavík deeps.