Tragedies stir fishing fleet to action
AS a UFAWU campaign to have all fishing vessels brought under federal steamship regulations gathers speed, B.C. herring fishermen mourn their dead.
The 1975 herring roe fishery draws to a close, leaving behind it a cruel wake of bereavement and lost vessels.
There has never been a season like it. In the space of three weeks, a dozen UFAWU and Native Brotherhood men have lost their lives. A Japanese technician also is drowned, and a Bellingham gillnetter is missing and presumed drowned on the west coast of Texada Island in a mishap unconnected with the fishery.
The carnage began just days after fishermen began hurriedly preparing for the grounds upon acceptance of Fisheries Association roe herring price offers March 14.
The gillnetter Lady Sylvia 2, owned by Thomas Goshko, 46, was found capsized about four miles west of Nootka Island at 12:30p.m. March 17. With Goshko were sons Tom, 22, and David, 20.
A UFAWU member, residing in Richmond, Goshko had worked the coast on fishing vessels and tugs for more than 14 years, and his wife refused to give up hope.
Nevertheless, a search that had included four Canadian Armed Forces aircraft, was called off a few days later, according to a rescue coordination centre spokesman, with Goshko and his sons presumed drowned.
The presumption was not shared by Mrs. Goshko. She hired an Okanagan helicopter from Campbell River, which, at $315 an hour, searched the area from Nootka Island to Ferrer Point. The search was fruitless.
Over the next several days a succession of vessels capsized and foundered without loss of life. And then, on March 25, tragedy struck again.
The 58-foot B.C. Producer, owned by J.S. McMillan Fisheries and cleared by the UFAWU, capsized in reportedly relatively calm waters about nine miles north of Cape Scott when it was hit by a wave.
James Tompkins of Burnaby hung on for half an hour before being rescued. He was reluctant to talk about his ordeal, but in Port Hardy coroner Roy Koch said there would be an inquest into the deaths of the skipper and two crewmen confirmed drowned.
The skipper was Louis Boroevich, 47, of Burnaby. His body and the bodies of crewmen Arvid Karsten Henriksen, 47, of Vancouver, and Thomas Frederick White, 47, of Vancouver, were recovered. The fifth man aboard the vessel, Lawrence James McLaughlin, 25, of Burnaby, was missing.
Just hours earlier, another UFAWU-cleared seiner, the 56-foot Bravado, had overturned in Hecate Strait about 20 miles off Sandspit.
Six men — four of them UFAWU members — drowned. Union members were Rick Johansen, 37, of Prince Rupert, the skipper; Guy Allard, born in 1931, Ray Windle, 33, and David Hawryluk, born in 1951, all of Prince Rupert.
Larry Azak, also of Prince Rupert, was a member of the Native Brotherhood. The Japanese technician on board was identified as Masaru Nida.
Both the Bravado and the B.C. Producer were empty and outward bound when disaster Struck. A friend of Johansen, who declined to be identified, was reported as saying the Bravado was riding high in the water without ballast.
The vessel was towed into Cumshewa inlet.
The crew of the B.C. Producer managed to get out mayday signals. The Caledonian and three other vessels were soon on the scene. Two of the Caledonian's crews went aboard a liferaft to rescue Tompkins. A rescue helicopter ferried him to Port Hardy about 20 minutes later.
There have been as many reasons given for disaster by survivors as there have been disasters. More often than not crew members simply didn't know what happened. Things happened fast. Many times it was night.
UFAWU assistant welfare director Barry Robbins told The Fisherman approximately $10,000 has been dispensed from the United Fishermen's Welfare Fund so far for loss of personal belongings. He anticipated that disbursements for death benefits might go as high as $70,000.
Bob Cameron, a crew man off the 129-foot packer Pacific Venture, which rolled over and sank near Estevan Point while carrying 250 tons of herring, reported on the welfare fund claim form that "water presumably got into to the lazaret and the boat listed rapidly, filling the engine room and galley, and went down stern first in a matter of minutes."
The Wishing Star was resting at an apparently safe anchorage near Cape Beale but the anchor dragged during the night and the vessel grounded. It was unable to get off and rolled over and holed itself when the tide went out. When it flooded again the crew lost their personal gear.
Robert Brown, a crew man off the brotherhood vessel Vampy, which sank with a load of herring during a run from the Queen Charlotte Islands to Prince Rupert, reported steering difficulties as the vessel crossed Hecate Strait. Seas were moderately heavy.
"For some reason the stern started to take on water, and on slowing down with the steering problem, the stern started to sink," Brown stated. "The circumstances compounded themselves and within 10 minutes we were swamped. The Ocean Invader came alongside and picked us up."
Brian O'Brien, 22, a crewman off the UFAWU-cleared Chief Seegay, which went down off Cape Beale with 60 tons of herring, recalls that the vessel was on its way from Bamfield to Vancouver.
"We made it a couple of miles and the swells started getting really bad, so we decided we'd better turn around and run back toward Bamfield. She started to list. The waves were hitting us and the load shifted to one side of the hatch. One wave hit us and we just went over."
The vessel stayed aloat for about half and hour and then went down in about 23 fathoms.
O'Brien apparently was the last one to make it to safety. "I was in a predicament where I couldn't get my (cabin) door open because of all the junk that had fallen down from my shelves, and my drawer flew open. So I was getting up to my knees in water and I couldn't see anything but water outside my porthole and I was getting to the point where I was thinking, 'Hey, I'm going to go down with this boat if something doesn't happen with this door pretty soon.' "
But something did happen. The weight of water outside tore the door off its hinges and O'Brien was able to scale his way up a companionway to safety.
Lawrence Quinn was skiff man on the table seiner Ernest Todd, which went down off Pachena March 19 at about 5:30 a.m. packing about 170 tons of herring from Sidney Inlet to the Canadian Fishing Company in Vancouver.
The crew were in their herring skiff no more than 15 minutes before they were picked up by the Cape Mark, from which they observed the last minutes of the stricken vessel by spotlight.
Quinn rose during the night and was told the boat was sinking. "The stern was awash," he recalled. "There were no freeboard at all and we had a real list to port."
He and two others launched the eight-man Davis raft but when it was pulled amidships it deflated on a broken intake valve.
Quinn said the Ernest Todd, built in 1942, carried the same •tonnage last year, but he admits the stern was pretty well down this time. "It could have taken a little less fish in the stern, for the outside."
But he noted that capsizing had been the case where loss of life occurred. "The Bravado and the B.C. Producer were empty. I think all these vessels should be riding in some sort of ballast. With all that weight on top and nothing downstairs, you're looking for trouble."
A. L. Yates photo
• The B.C. Producer, built at New Westminster in 1947, overturned in Georgia Strait during the winter herring reduction fishery on February 8, 1965. On that occasion crew members were picked up by the Canadian Coast Guard vessel Ready after a 4'2-hour ordeal. On March 25, when she capsized off Cape Scott, her skipper, Louis Boreovich, and three or her four crew members were drowned. Only one man, James Tompkins, survived.
• The W6, launched at Tacoma, Wash., in 1917 as the American Girl, was close to half a century old. She foundered in rough seas off the Nitinat Triangle on March 19, one day after the Ernest Todd sank off Pachena Point. Happily, Dave Patterson, her skipper, and his five crew members were picked up by other fishing vessels in the vicinity.
• The Pacific Venture, formerly the Tahsis Straits, also was built at Tacoma, Wash., back in 1942, the same year the Ernest Todd, formerly the Norcrest, left the ways at San Francisco. She was packing 250 tons of herring when she rolled over and sank off Pachena Point on March 21. Again, her skipper and five crew members were rescued.
THE FISHERMAN — APRIL 4, 1975—7