Liferaft floats free - eventually - and is found.

Yet another example of how the lives of fishermen are put at risk when the very equipment that is there to protect them fails to function. These days boats like the Ben My Chree are subject to stringent safety regulation and assessments - the equipment they carry on board, like EPIRBs (Emergency Position Indicaiton Radio Beacons) and liferafts are supposed to activate after being submersed. It is just as well the crew of the BMC did not have to rely on their liferaft last Friday should the boat have sunk when they were aboard, on Monday the Sennen lifeboat was alerted and called out to pick up an inflated liferaft - three days after the vessel sank off Carn Base.

Margaretha Maria BM148 - liferaft on sea bed.

In other accidents the outcome has been less favourable; when the Margaretha Maria sank in 1997 south of the Lizard with the loss of all hands, both liferafts failed to activate - one can be seen here on the sea bed next to the hull.

The demise of the Ben My Chree signifies the end of an era in Newlyn. When she arrived in 1978 she was rigged for side trawling. At the time there were a handful of similar private boats and W Stevenson's fleet had four old wooden MFVs and four Sputniks all trawling. The four steel Sputniks were soon converted to beam trawling as the company put all its eggs in that basket. Meanwhile, the fleet of private trawlers grew. In the fifteen years that followed the arrival of the BMC, Newlyn's fleet of trawlers around and above 15m grew and grew.

Until last week, she was the last remaining boat in the port from the days when there was the Pathfinder, Gamrie Bay, Scarlet Thread, Keriolet, Galilean (replaced by the Ocean Harvester), Girl Patricia, Confide, La Critique, Defiant, Wyre Star, Fern, Green Cormorant, Excellent, Jacqueline, Trewarveneth, Anthony Stevenson, Bervie Braes, Sarah Shaun, ABS, Nicola Marie, Three Lads, Rose of Sharon, Lia G, Marina, and several others that came and went!

How times have changed, in today's fleet of Newlyn trawlers over 15m there is.................... the Crystal Sea II!

Shelterbox in Japan.

Local disaster aid charity Shelterbox are currently setting up aid posts in Japan following in the wake of the disaster. There are many ways in which you can support the teams out there. One innovative company is auctioning a number of designer items for the home - which will give you a chance of getting something in return for your support!

Out of the fryer and into.......

No doubt the local chippies will be keeping a close eye on their younger staff just in case they have any ideas of following in the footsteps of a certain Alexander Beck from Thaxted in Essex who is now the hottest young male on Europe's catwalks after being headhunted by a modelling agency from his £90 per week job behind the deep fryer!

Hey, there, Mr. Blue, we're so pleased to be with you,

Although there was fog at ground level, the sky above was clear enough........

plenty of fins about.......

and a good shot of mullet fromWhitesand Bay.......

the market's favourite colour is still black, and the boats are beginning to see larger numbers of very small cuttles - an interesting development in the catch pattern - a CEFAS project in the making.......

this big shot of John Dory will keep many a restaurant happy re-writing their menu for the next few days....

making her way in to land........

the Nova Spero heads for a berth near the market.......

where Milford Mike takes a shore rope..........

it's an early start aboard the Exeter built Samson B for local firm WindWave Workboats, after steaming down from Liverpool the guys have a night off in their home port before heading for Exeter and then on up to the next job off Grimsby on another wind farm.......

between towing jobs, MTS Taktow takes a break again in Newlyn.

Best is in the West - we knew it!

Seems the West Country is giving the Big Smoke a good run for its money when it comes to innovative cooking and ethically sourced quality local produce - the latest Trenchermen's Guide has had a great launch day over at Padstow. A cluster of cheffing names to savour, Rick Stein and fellow chefs Nathan Outlaw, Jonray Sanchez-Iglesias, Peter Sanchez-Iglesias, Michael Caines were all on the roof of the Seafood Restaurant at Padstow today, demonstrating that with Cornwall's first 2 Star Michelein restaurant just over the river at the Roc Hotel the region is making sure of its place on the 'must eat at' map.

Save some paper and see the new guide in an online version on your screen now.

The TV crews were there to record the event on a fittingly Spring-like day.

Would be good to know just how many of the restaurants featured source their fish from Cornish ports - 80%?

Search and Rescue off Sendai in Japan.

All the vessels in this AIS image are either tugs, SAR of fishing boats in the waters off Sendai, Japan.

Andrew Munson - with hair!

Andrew Munson by Zed Nelson©

The weekend magazine from the Guardian has a collection of images shot by Zed Neslon as part of a photographic essay on, Disappearing Britain. The images include one of Newlyn's very own Harbourmaster, Andrew Munson - in working gear.

By coincidence, the set of Cornish fishermen images also includes the crew of the Ben My Chree at the time when she was one of a small fleet of boats fishing for tuna. Ironically, one of the crew, Zac Heiney, was aboard the St Piran last Friday when she made an unsuccessful attempt to tow in the BMC.

The full set of nine images by Zed Nelson can be seen on his web site here.