Programming note

Nick Mavar crosses the bar

Here's the story in The New York Times.

F/V Northwestern v. Original Productions

Here's an interesting lawsuit.

‘Deadliest Catch,’ season 18

"Deadliest Catch" will get going again April 19 with a two-hour premiere.

"For the first time in 25 years, the tenacious 'Deadliest Catch' captains must search the seas for a new way to earn a living when red king crab fishing is shut down for the season," says this news release from Discovery.

'Deadliest Catch' turns 10

The reality TV show Deadliest Catch kicks off its 10th season tonight.

Featured boats will include the Northwestern, Time Bandit, Wizard, Cape Caution, Saga, Seabrooke and Cornelia Marie.

D-day

"Deadliest Catch," season nine, launches tonight on the Discovery Channel. Check your local listings.

Here are your vessel crews, looking all badass with their hoodies and beards. Not a smile in the bunch.

For your entertainment

Deadliest Catch begins its eighth season Tuesday night. Check your local listings, potheads.

Deckboss also recommends you catch Salmon Fishing in the Yemen, a really nice movie in theaters now.

Pot party tonight

"Deadliest Catch," Season 7, premieres tonight. Check your local listings, I guess.

Your performers this trip out are the crews of the Cornelia Marie, Kodiak, Northwestern, Time Bandit, Wizard and new boats Ramblin' Rose and Seabrooke.

Crab bits

The lucrative Bristol Bay red king crab and Bering Sea snow crab fisheries opened at noon Friday. Get your drawn butter ready.

Here are a few notes to mark the season start:

• It's been five years since the crab fisheries were "rationalized." That is, since the quotas were sliced into individual shares for fishermen and processors. That took a lot of the fight out of the fisheries. Another effect was the drastic consolidation of the fleet; once the race for crab ended, the need for so many boats evaporated overnight. Here's the trend: 101 vessels fished in the first year of rationalization, 91 in the second year, 87 in the third, 88 in the fourth and 78 in the fifth. For this season, 63 crab boats had registered to fish as of opening day. That's a far cry from the 250-plus boats that used to go after the top prize, Bristol Bay red king crab, prior to rationalization.

• The Alaska Department of Fish and Game is losing its longtime crab fishery manager at Dutch Harbor. Forrest Bowers is leaving at the end of the year to take a new position with the National Marine Fisheries Service in Juneau. Thanks, Forrest, for all your help over the years.

• Finally, although the crab fisheries are tamer than they used to be and nowhere near as deadly, what would a new crab season be without a TV film crew to stir things up? From the Unalaska police blotter:

Disorderly conduct, Oct. 14 — Drunken crew members of two vessels from the quasi-reality show "Deadliest Catch" squared off against each other in the lobby of the Grand Aleutian hotel. Those interviewed claimed "bad blood" between the two vessels had instigated the altercation.

Programming note

Uh, yeah, season six of Deadliest Catch premieres tonight.

This year's celebrity crab boats include the Cornelia Marie, Kodiak, Northwestern, Time Bandit and Wizard.

Remembering Capt. Phil

Lots of Phil Harris video moments here.

Capt. Phil Harris crosses the bar

Phil Harris, the "Deadliest Catch" crab boat skipper who suffered a stroke recently while delivering his catch at St. Paul Island, has passed away, the Discovery Channel is reporting on its Web site.

An update on ailing 'Deadliest Catch' skipper

The Discovery Channel is reporting some encouraging news on the condition of Phil Harris, the "Deadliest Catch" crab boat captain who suffered a recent stroke while the Cornelia Marie was in St. Paul making a delivery.

Crab boat hobbled but OK in Bering

Just talked with the U.S. Coast Guard, which is monitoring a crab boat with engine trouble in the Bering Sea.

The Lisa Marie dropped some cylinders and is limping its way to Dutch Harbor, making 3-5 knots, a Coast Guard spokesman in Juneau told me.

Weather isn't especially rough at this time.

The Lisa Marie has been featured on the hit cable show "Deadliest Catch." I'm not sure whether she has a camera crew aboard this season.

'Deadliest' fans at the fair

A fan of the hit cable show 'Deadliest Catch' awaits an autograph from Phil Harris, captain of the Bering Sea crab boat Cornelia Marie. A long line of 'Deadliest' devotees waited to greet Harris on Friday at the Alaska State Fair, which ends today. Jim Paulin photo

Some clarifications on Togiak man overboard case

Deckboss has felt a little frustration over the quality of information coming from the U.S. Coast Guard on the man overboard case out of Togiak.

It's now clear the boat involved, the Miss Colleen, is a 32-foot gillnetter, not a 28-foot seiner. Further, it's likely the boat isn't homeported in either Metlakatla or Anacortes, Wash.

Based on the information below from the Alaska State Troopers, the boat belonged to Nick Mavar, who has a post office box in South Naknek, state records show.

A reader believes Mavar might have a "Deadliest Catch" connection, but I haven't verified this.

Here is today's press release from the Alaska State Troopers:

Location: Togiak Bay
Type: Search and rescue
On 8/01/09 at 0230 hours, the Alaska State Troopers in Dillingham were notified by the USCG that they were involved in a SAR in the area of Togiak Bay. Investigation revealed that the evening of 7/31/09, 31-year-old Benjamin Symmes, of Montana, was acting as the sole deck hand aboard the fishing vessel Miss Colleen during the Togiak fishery. Sometime around 2030 hours, Symmes fell overboard from the vessel while it was under way, unbeknown to the boat's skipper, Nick Mavar, age 44, of Washington state. Symmes was not wearing a PFD. Once Mavar realized Symmes had fallen overboard, a massive search began that involved 20 fishing vessels, several USCG aircraft and Togiak residents that continued for 20 hours. The afternoon of 8/01/09, the search for Symmes was suspended. Symmes was not located. The next of kin was contacted and made aware of the situation.

Feeling crabby

Deckboss hears a group of concerned Bering Sea crab fishermen are holding something of a summit this morning in Seattle with Jim Balsiger, head of the National Marine Fisheries Service.

They're meeting at the Bay Cafe at Fishermen's Terminal to express worries about a potential slashing of the snow crab catch limit this coming winter season.

Here's a recent item I wrote for Pacific Fishing magazine that explains:

OPILIO WOES: Will next season’s Bering Sea snow crab harvest be a lot smaller? Very possibly, though not purely for lack of crab. The concern is that the stock hasn’t made enough progress under a 10-year federal rebuilding plan implemented in 2000 after the crab population, and the commercial catch, took a nosedive. A group of scientists, the Crab Plan Team, has recommended a significant cut in the catch limit for this coming winter season to meet the rebuilding goal by the required 2011. Two factors, however, could have a major bearing on whether we see a quota cut: the results of this summer’s at-sea stock survey, and a forthcoming federal legal opinion on the implications of not rebuilding the stock within the specified timeframe. Bering Sea snow crab harvests have ranged from 25 million pounds to more than 60 million pounds this decade. But the growing catch remains a far cry from hauls of more than 300 million pounds seen in the early 1990s. Because of the rebuilding concerns, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game will delay its announcement on the season catch limit until October to allow for additional scientific review. Normally the quota is announced by late September.

Word is this morning's breakfast meeting with Balsiger could draw even some "Deadliest Catch" celebrity crabbers like Sig Hansen.

Significantly, here's that legal opinion from NMFS clarifying the situation on snow crab rebuilding.

I don't have time to analyze the letter this morning, but I hear some crab industry players view it with some relief.

Uh, yeah

Tomorrow night is the Season 5 premiere of the Discovery Channel reality show "Deadliest Catch."