Fishing vessel Athena on fire 250 miles off the Isles of Scilly.

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Earlier this morning a distress call was received from the Faeroese registered fishing vessel Athena reporting that she was on fire 250 miles South West of the Isles for Scilly. Amazingly, she appears to be crewed by 111 fishermen, most of whom have taken to the ship's liferafts and leaving around 30 men on board to fight the fire. Falmouth Coastguard are co-ordinating the distress situation along with their counterpart at Brest, though to be the nearest port to the stricken vessel.

FCG Press release:
Wednesday, 27 October 2010
FALMOUTH COASTGUARD ALERTED TO FISH FACTORY SHIP ON FIRE



At just after 6.00 am this morning Falmouth Coastguard were alerted to a major fire on board the 89 metre Faroese registered fish factory ship ‘Athena’ which is 230 miles south west of the Isles of Scilly and 270 nautical miles west of the Pointe Du Penmarche at Brittany. The vessel has 111 people on board.
The Master of the ‘Athena’ evacuated 81 non essential personnel to liferafts whilst his remaining crew continued to fight the fire which is located in the port side forward processing area of the vessel. The Master has indicated that the fire is lessening, although it is not out yet.

A Falcon 50 fixed wing aircraft was scrambled from a French airfield to provide a communications link and a Royal Navy helicopter from RNAS Culdrose was scrambled to the Scillies to refuel. Due to the distances a rescue helicopter would only have 20 minutes above the scene before having to return for fuel. Falmouth Coastguard relayed the mayday signal into the area and 5 ships responded to the emergency call. The nearest, the ‘Vega’, a container ship, is now on scene and attempting to take on board those mix of crew who abandoned to the liferafts. There are a mix of nationalities on board the ‘Athena’ including, Chinese, Russian, Peruvian and Scandinavian personnel.

The weather on scene currently are south westerly winds of force 5 – 6 with a moderate sea.

The operation is continuing.

Pictures on Twitter from the French Navy helicopter over the scene.

Name change.

 Talk from the fish buyers steam up the windows of the market cafe........

 leaving an empty auction hall and empty boxes on another quiet morning.......

 with just the one beam trawler landed........

at the end of the quay the Govenek of Ladram makes ready to sail after the worst of a big spring tide passes......

but the Billy Rowney won't be going anywhere for a few days till the gear is put back together......

apprehension, botheration, consternation, desperation, exasperation, frustration, gentrification, hallucination - the Inspiration moves on a gentle run in the harbour.......

nowadays there's plenty of fish and not enough boats at sea to catch them........

over in Penzance wet dock, work continues to change the face of long-time resident Sea King, now name changed to My Lady Norma 1........

outside the dock, Scillonian III makes her way astern to the pierhead before embarking on one of the few reamining voyages to the Scillies for the year........

not, not under command, two reds up in the harbour..........

plenty of new construction work underway on the Scillies judging by the cargo waiting to go aboard the Gry Maritha.

St Peters' pics.

Examples of work from two of St Peter's School students who were keen enough to get up well before first light to get the pictures in the port early on Monday morning of this week - with thanks Matt Kazmiercsak and Tania Mundell.

New Seafood Cornwall Training fish filleting courses at Penwith College.

Penwith College main dining area.....



inside the stunning training kitchen......

 

the training restuarant overlooks Mount's bay!

Penwith College recently played host to the first in a series of fish filleting courses for fish merchants in Cornwall in its superb new training kitchen in Penzance. Organised and subsidised by Seafood Cornwall Training Ltd under the expert tutellage of Anne Sibert, six members of staff from fish businesses across the county practiced a range of filleting and fish handling techniques.

Not all rubbish is rubbish it seems - or one man's stone trap is another's fence!

Well before the Fishing for Litter scheme, farmers have recycled flotsam and jetsam for years - this looks like a stone trap designed by Winston Phillips when he worked for Bridport and Gundry - chances are it was lost from the Ocean Harvester under the command of Mervyn Mountjoy back in the late 1980s.

At that time the trawler Keriolet also fished with a stone trap - on a trawling watch you would sense that you had picked up a stone or notice the boat slow down or be slow to 'come round' (turn) or you might spot the exhaust temperature had risen as the engine worked harder - they were designed to pick up bigger stones and hold them so that when the trawl was hauled the belly wasn't ripped out which was what would often happen - on trawlers like the Keriolet, mending a trawl with a missing belly section in the stern deck at sea could take many hours of solid work with two men cutting out and mending, one filling needles, making tea and rolling cigarettes while another would be on watch (but that was in the days when such a boat would be four handed) at night the boat would exhibit 'two reds' to show that she was not under command the bulk of the trawl would be still in the water and the boat would therefore be unable to comply with the Collision Regs as prescribed.

Black is gold.

Just what the Brixham boys have been waiting for, signs that the cuttlefish season is upon us.......

just the one beamer landed to the market this morning......

so there's not much call for the grader.......

after yesterday's Spring like morning a wet, warm and westerly wind washes over the quay.......

and whistles through the market.

Food for thought.........?

There's a growing number of food festivals taking place around the country these days. The latest finished in Dartmouth at the weekend with fish supplied by nearby Brixham top of the menu and cooked by chefs like Mark Hix and Valentine Warner (who starred at Falmouth oyster Festival recenlty) with top food writer Tom Parker-Bowles in attendance to spice up the culinary cook-in and oversee all the live action around the stoves of the Seahorse Restaurant.

Given the  diversity of quality fish and the growing number of specialist food producers in the area, maybe its time for the far reaches of the Cornish peninsula to get cooking on a similar project?

Included on the ingredients list today - mackerel, cuttlefish and pollack!