Merry Christmas from the Pacific Ocean! (Dec 25)

I’m going to keep this one short, I’m cueing up The Polar Express on my laptop to watch since it’s family tradition, but today is Christmas and I wanted to share a brief post with you all. I’ve got to remember to thank my friend Whitney (source of about 3 TB of movies) for having

Flying Fish and Zombie Kills (Dec 24)

We aren’t just catching tuna out here, that isn’t the way the ocean works. When we cast our nets inevitably we will get some other species of fish. With the exception of some fish the crew deem not worthy of eating, which isn’t very many, most of the by-catch gets carved up into sashimi or

Nick Henderson and his Airborne Telephone Service (Dec 23)

Do ship to ship radio communication problems have you down? Are your fellow Captains just not receiving you? Need a lift in your transmission capacity and your spirits? Look no further, I give you my very own Airborne Telephone Service! That’s right, for just a bit over $13 per minute you can make all the

Something About this Morning (Dec 22)

We were drifting all night, waiting to set early in the morning on a “payow” that had shown a particularly large amount of fish on the sonar two days earlier when we found it. The raft and buoy themselves were covered in shells and sea life, and we could see fish swimming in and out

The Haze (Dec 21)

I’m not sure what is causing this haze we’re in but the sky is so obscured it reminds me of central Washington this summer when I was flying there during all the wildfires. Visibility out here is normally unlimited or nothing at all, the two extremes. It’s like the weather, it’s either nice – or

Things Are Looking Up (Dec 20)

We’ve been in the Solomon waters for a few days now, it feels like, and we’re having a whole lot more action than we were having in Tuvalu. The schools are back, or more accurately, we’ve caught up to the schools and that means more flying for me – which is more than ok in

We’re in the Solomons (Dec 19)

Well, more or less. Yesterday the Captain decided to make the move from the Tuvalu fishing grounds to the Solomon fishing grounds because there just wasn’t any tuna where we were. Later I found out that the entire Dong Won fishing fleet had already made that move, so it sounds like our Captain was gambling

NFR (Dec 18)

NFR is the code we use when there is “No Flight Required” and I hate making these entries in my weekly and monthly log. If I had my way I’d wake up, eat breakfast, go to the helicopter around 8 in the morning, fly for two hours, then after lunch do the same thing. Instead,

The Loudness of a Dull Thud (Dec 17)

The Loudness of a Dull Thud I can hear the hull smashing against the waves outside, the bow cuts through the swells with a dull thud. A thumping noise that you might think doesn’t sound too bad, but then I remember that I am literally the furthest person away from the bow and if I

It’s Not Always Sunny (Dec 16)

The last few days we have been in the middle of that storm that had been chasing us. It caught up and jus didn’t go away. That is, until today when the clouds seemingly started to lag behind us. Then the intercom went off. The Captain had called for me to come to the bridge.