Okay update on that last 36hrs of my world. Wake up 4AM on Thursday morning, hookup with Lou on his 38 Donzi "Hot Reels" for an offshore Shark Charter with customers Bill Dimaio his Daughter Lauren and some of their close friends. Take them out to Coxes Ledge and pound the Mahi Mahi. After a couple hours of that we set up a chum slick and almost immediately get hammered by a MASSIVE thresher shark. Bill takes hold of the shark and hangs on for dear life while the Beast dances across the surface of the water. Unfortunately the sharks charges he boat then quickly zings to the Stern getting his body parallel with the line. There was nothing we could do but watch in horror as the Sharks tail bypasses the 9ft custom wire leader and frays through the 130lb mono, cutting him free. Both impressed by getting a Thresher right out of the gate and disgusted for losing it, we quickly re-rigged some baits and got back to it. After one or two nice Blue Sharks, it was Laurens turn to fight and did she ever, after setting the hook on her bait a nice Mako came rocketing out of the water for a quick aerial show. After a short battle she had the fish whipped and secured some nice steaks for her and her family to take home. We stuck it out a little while longer until everyone had a few sharks each and then around 4 we headed back in.So now its 5 and Lou and I are back at the dock refueling for the next trip which started only 2 hours away, this time it's with Lou's Customers and Friends Christian and his son Mark for 24hrs of canyon fishing. (That's right we just fished from 4am to 5pm and now we are heading out for a 24hr canyon trip "Iron Man") So we load up with the new gas, ice and crew and do a quick check on ocean temp and head out for the long 4hr ride to Hydrographers Canyon 140 miles to our numbers. After 4 hours of steaming in to the bright full moon light night we found a nice temp break in some decent water. Lou commented on liking the bait he saw in the light of his hydro glow light. So the plan was set up a couple of bait rigs for swords and tuna, drop a few jigs or as we like to call it deploying the probes, and then catch some shut eye for a long day of tuna fishing on the edge.
Lou and I set up some nice rigs including a cool new light lure from Carlson lures and set them up for the evening. Exhausted from leadering all of the sharks from our first trip I lean up against the console and began to doze off. About 2 hours go by, its now 2AM and I'm violently woken up to screaming drag and clicker BRRRRRRRRRRRRR "I'm on guys, Get ready this fish is a Stross" Lou says. (Stross being a term Lou uses to describe fish that are huge or monstrosities) I sprang to my feet and begin to clear the other lines and the deck for the impending battle.
Doing so it became very apparent that Lou had gotten into the red bull, as even after fishing for sharks all day and heading to the canyon at midnight, he managed to empty and entire bag of chum baits, set up another bait rig, dead stick a ronz lure, jig for yellow fin and hook up with this Freak Fish. While the rest of our crew helped clear the deck, I hopped behind the wheel and Started up the engines for some serious "shake and bake".
The new Finnor Santiago 80w was getting completely dumped to the backing and the Local Hooker rod was seriously "Getting Bent." Lou looked back at me with a concerned face and said he's taking everything and the drag is at 40lbs!!!! We had to make a move quickly so I spun the boat towards the fish and Lou began the nightmare battle of 6 inches in, 20 yards out, repeat! Whenever we could get the fish near the surface it would charge the boat, spin towards the engines and if when that didn't work for him, he'd sound. To compensate for the fishes antics I was constantly maneuvering boat, between chasing back line, backing down and cutting the wheel 360 degrees and back spinning the bow away when he would charge us bill first, I thought I was going to need splints for my wrists! If you looked at an aerial view of the boat's gps track during the battle, it would probably look like calligraphy! I was getting the workout of a life time just handling the boat let what Lou was going through on the Rod and Reel. At one point Lou looked over at me and said I'm so tired right now is this really happening. (Both Lou and I have battled numerous Giant Tuna and Marlin and had never been given the business the way this Fish did).
Before we know it 3 hours goes by, the sun was beginning to rise, and the fish was finally showing signs of fatigue. The powerful circles that it was using to try and cut our line, became wider and wider and closer to the surface. Finally the fish came up to the surface in a circle and gave us a glimpse of his massive shape; we knew that it was going to be trouble. Christian readied the harpoon and basket and brought it over to Lou. The Fish came up to the surface and made a move towards the stern, I cut the Wheel hard into the direction of the fishes spin giving Lou a wide open shot with the harpoon. He took the Harpoon in one hand with the rod still in the other and nailed the fish Spartan style while I simultaneously sunk a flying gaff near its tail, it was officially lights out.
So now, there we were with a fish of a lifetime but we had a new problem. How do we get this thing into the boat? After an hour of different attempts, we ultimately where able to drag the fish, bill first through the Tuna door on the stern. Home free right, not exactly we heaved the fish up to the bow of the vessel to put it into the massive "Coffin Box" for storing fish. This box is big enough to fit 4 grown men into or two huge tuna. We slid the fish into the box and to our despair the fishes head bill and tail stuck way out of box while the body stayed inside.We wanted an official weight so we didn’t want to cut it up. We had a tuff call to make, fish all day for tuna and risk ruining this amazing meat, or dump all of the ice we have on the fish and race home 4hrs and 140 miles away. And that we did. So into a 15knot Head sea and 4 foot seas we raced back to Point Judith. The head sea made us earn every inch, as it pounded on the boat so hard that it actually snapped the shackle on the bow anchor sending flying into the water. (Add another 250 to the cost of this run for us) Finally we make into the harbor refuge and began to text everyone we knew about the fish and invited as many people as we could to come see this catch of a lifetime. After texting so much that I killed my phones battery we made way for Snug Harbor Marina to weigh in the fish.
At the dock a crowd had already began to gather and watch as we pulled up to the crane and scale. They lowered the chain and we attached the tail rope around the tree trunk this fish had for a caudal fin. Bets and heckling about the fish's actual weight were being shouted out. The scale was barely able to get the entire fish off the ground. When it finally did the monster fish tipped the scales at a whopping 434lbs. We filled out a weigh in slip, took a ton of pictures, shook some hands and with the help of our friend Steve from Lady K and the staff on the dock at snug harbor marina, began to process the fish. It turned out to be one of the rare pumpkin swords, which have a rich orange to pink meat based on their specialized diets. Added Bonus! Needless to say it's been an interesting 48 hours, and a lot of fun doing what we love for work! Hell Yeah!Capt Jack Sprengel
Oh yeah I forgot to mention that this fish is the new Rhode Island State Record, Shattering the old one by as much as 120lbs! Hell Yeah!
