Pics of F/V Northwestern Crew at work…

The Discovery website–which strives to be as interactive as possible these days–has a “Photo of the Week” section dedicated to Deadliest Catch images.  For each image,  readers and fans are encouraged to create a caption and eventually those “captions” are put up to vote so that a favorite one may be chosen.  The pictures below are a few Northwestern crew Photos of the week displayed there. (All images are courtesy of Discovery) 

Northwestern crew “on the crab“

Edgar Hansen

Capt. Sig Hansen

Greenhorn Jake Andersen

Deckhand Matt Bradley

Photos of Deadliest Catch Skippers & Deckhands at the Ballard Seafood Fest

It appeared to be beautiful weather in Ballard, Washington this weekend for the Ballard Seafood Festival that has been an annual event since 1974.  It was however, very deadly out as many of the featured Deadliest Catch captains and a few deckhands were on the scene signing autographs and posing with multitudes of fans.  Attending were Sig Hansen, Larry and Kenny Hendricks, Phil and Josh and Jake Harris, and Greg and Ragnhild Moncrief.

Prepared for anything as usual, Sig Hansen of the F/V Northwestern sits with a line up of–count them–not one or two, but five sharpies, ready to get down to the business of signing shirts! Photo courtesy of Deadliest Catch fan, Mel.

Larry Hendricks of the Sea Star and Phil Harris of the Cornelia Marie also keep themselves busy signing shirts for fans.  Larry Hendricks just arrived in Seattle by way of the Sea Star.  She had been docked in Ketchikan, Alaska since being refurbished to give tours but the Sea Star is now officially in the lower 48!  Lucky west-coast fans may get the opportunity to see her while she’s around.  Photo courtesy of Mel

Recently returned from Salmon Tendering in the Bristol Bay area, Ragnhild Moncrief is all smiles on stage during the introduction of Deadliest Catch celebs. Photo courtesy of Ann

Josh and Jake Harris of the F/V Cornelia Marie pose with fans and seem to have taken to their celebrity status as easily as crab fishing.  Thanks Mel

The head of the Harris clan, Capt. Phil of the F/V Cornelia Marie, looks trim and fit this summer.  Mel, you sure take good photos

Sig, Phil, Ragnhild, Greg, and Larry all lined up on stage during the meet and greet, question and answer session.  Photo courtesy of Carrie Hollingshead.

Sig Hansen of the F/V Northwestern, during their autograph session. Quite a satisfactory day for Deadliest Catch fans…

Sig Hansen at Roche Harbor on the San Juan Island…

~ Celebrity Crabbing Demo ~ We are thrilled to have the one & only Captain Sig Hansen, owner & operator of the F/V Northwestern crab catching vessel featured on Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch”.   We admit – this is sort of like learning about Finances from Donald Trump… but it is sure to be entertaining nonetheless!  Don’t miss it!!                      5th Annual Island Rendezvous 07/27/2007 - 07/29/2007 *****

Join us July 27th-29th for Seattle Boat Company’s 5th Annual Rendezvous, a getaway for owners and enthusiasts at beautiful Roche Harbor on the San Juan Island.  Meet other boat owners and have tons of fun with the many activities that are planned.  All boat shapes, sizes, and conditions are welcome.  With so many things to do, it’s fun for the whole family!      SCHEDULE OF EVENTS (Descriptions of events below)         Friday, July  27th Registration:  2pm – 8pm Seattle Boat Company’s Floating Boat Show:  2pm – 6pm Welcome Reception – Appetizers & “Docktails”:  6pm – 8pm Roche Harbor’s Traditional Colors Ceremony & Announcements:  8:45pm Live Music at the Madrona Bar & Grill:  9:30pm – 1am         Saturday, July 28th   *NEW* Pancake Breakfast by the Seattle Boat staff: 8am – 10am  Registration:  10am – 4pm   Seattle Boat Company’s Floating Boat Show: 10am – 5pm   *NEW* Celebrity Crabbing Demo:  10am – 12pm   “Junior First Mate” Training:  1:00pm – 3:00pm  Celebrity Chef Food Demo & Wine Tasting:  4:00pm – 6:00pm   Seattle Boat “Barge-E-Que”:  7pm – 9pm   Roche Harbor’s Traditional Colors Ceremony & Announcements:  8:45pm   Live Music at the Madrona Bar & Grill:  9:30pm – 1am            DESCRIPTION OF EVENTS~ Celebrity Chef Food Demo & Wine Tasting ~ Executive Chef Christina Orchid from Christina’s on Orcas Island is known for her passion for ingredients and simple preparation.  She will share her expertise on cooking in the Northwest with us in a 2-hour food & wine presentation. Learn more about our guest host and her restaurant with “that stunning view” at: http://www.christinas.net/~ Celebrity Crabbing Demo ~ We are thrilled to have the one & only Captain Sig Hansen, owner & operator of the F/V Northwestern crab catching vessel featured on Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch”.  We admit – this is sort of like learning about Finances from Donald Trump… but it is sure to be entertaining nonetheless!  Don’t miss it!!~ Live Music at the Madrona Bar & Grill ~ Enjoy live music on Friday and Saturday night from 9:30pm to 1am at the Madrona Bar & Grill, located in Roche Harbor Village. Madrona Grill is one of the Northwest’s most famous bars offering a breathtaking view of Roche Harbor’s Marina and the sunset. ~ “Junior First Mate” Training ~ This is the 5th annual Seattle Boat “Junior First Mate” certification program.  We’ll have fun boating related activities planned for the children of the group – from “message in a bottle” to sea life identity exercises.  Fun for all ages!~ Seattle Boat “Barge-E-Que” ~ Join us at the newly remodeled, twice-the-size covered dock for this year’s barbeque and presentation of awards.  The ten will be loaded with food and spirit, and the barbeques will be stoked and fired beginning at 6pm. This catered event features local San Juan Islands fare from Hailey’s Bait Shop & Grill.  All you need to bring is your appetite for food and fun!~ Seattle Boat Company’s Floating Boat Show ~ Experience spectacular new 2007 boats from Sunseeker and Cobalt – this special viewing is sure to float your boat! ~ Traditional Colors & Announcements ~ Stand together with us and celebrate our great nation’s flag as it is lowered at sunset. This has become a proud tradition of Roche Harbor performed daily during the summer months.  Welcome Reception – Appetizers and “Docktails” ~ Join us as we kick-off the weekend with a welcome reception and introductions. Enjoy delicious appetizers, walk the docks with your favorite “docktails” and get to know your fellow Seattle Boat boaters.

SIG HANSEN

By Danny Scott–September 25, 2005 (Originally published just after season 1)

At 39, Sig Hansen is captain of the Northwestern, one of the most successful crab boats fishing the perilous Bering Sea. It is regarded as one of the world’s deadliest jobs; over 50 men are lost from the fleet every year. Hansen lives in Seattle with his wife, June, and two children, Nina, 14, and Mandy, 10

“There are two big months for Alaskan crab — October and January — and the first day of the season is pretty much your most important day. I’ll be up at the wheel from about 6am, and I probably won’t have slept much. You’re just too jacked up. Too nervous. Too amped. All you do on the first morning is watch the other boats in the fleet. A lot of the guys will take a peek before the season starts, so you have to work out if they know something you don’t. All the skippers lie to each other anyways — you have to work out who’s bullshitting who.                       

Photo courtesy of Dan Lamont. © 2006 by Dan Lamont
  See more of his photography at http://www.danlamont.com/ 

Last year, I heard a rumour there were crabs up north, but I was the only one who headed north. We were suckin’ ‘em up all on our own. That was a good year.There’s no daily shower on board because of the limited water supply, so you basically live in the same underwear for as long as you’re out there. After a while, you don’t even notice the smell.

I make sure the crew gets a decent breakfast on the first day. Those guys are going to be doing serious physical work for maybe a week or two — they deserve to live like kings once in a while. We might have omelette and eggs benedict, meat and potatoes, maybe some left-over goulash. This is probably the last time we’re all going to sit down and relax together for a while, so I also like to do a pep talk and get the guys psyched up.

After breakfast it’s a free-for-all out there. All the boats are jockeying for position and, like the rest of the skippers, I’m trying to decide how I’m going to spread my gear. Some guys only drop a few [crab] pots and try to get a feel for different areas, but I tend to dump everything in one go. You have to go by gut instinct. And you’re keeping one eye on the weather. If you’ve got strong northerly winds and want to move from east to west, you have to work hard to keep the water off the boat. When one of those waves comes over the rail, the crew give you a nasty look.

You can’t keep regular hours on a fishing boat; nobody rings the lunch bell when you’re out at sea. It’s up to you to fend for yourself. If there’s a spare five minutes you grab a sandwich, but most of the time my lunch is cigarettes, coffee and chocolate. My crew is pretty lucky, though — I like to see they get three squares a day. I know some skippers who would just toss a box of candy onto the deck, then lock the door. “Here’s your frikkin’ lunch. Now quit complainin’ and let’s haul some frikkin’ gear!”

When you’re crab-fishing, time is money. I heard about one boat that made $140,000 per man in one season. The Northwestern carries about 250 crab pots, and we drop them about a quarter of a mile apart, but that all depends on the weather. The weather is part of a fisherman’s life. It’s our friend and enemy. They say this is a dangerous job, but I never think about that. I’m fourth-generation fisherman, so I was on the boats as a kid and, at 22, I was the youngest skipper in the fleet. But let me tell you, I’ve never lost a man, and I’m very proud of that fact. Had some close calls, though, and I’ve made some silly mistakes.

One time, I was getting a bit too throttle-happy when the seas were pretty choppy, and this 40ft wave picked us up and tossed us right back down into the sea. A 40ft wave looks pretty scary, I can tell you — it’s like having a three-storey building falling onto the ship. The boat nose-dived under the water — thank God none of the guys were on deck. As it was, somebody had left a window open and the boat filled with water, but we managed to deal with it. That time we got away with it, but we were very lucky.

Probably the most dangerous time is when you’re up on the pots. Those things are over 7ft wide and weigh almost 800lb — empty. Imagine one full of crabs over 3ft wide and weighing upwards of 20lb each. When that thing’s swinging around on the crane, it can come straight at you. You have to jump up on the pot and hope it doesn’t hit anything. We call that “taking a ride”. It’s like a fairground ride, only this one can break bones. And so can the crabs. If one gets hold of your finger, he’s going to break it. No problem. Sure, I know plenty of guys that have passed away. But I’ve been hearing these stories from my grandad and my dad all my life. That’s just how it is.

The end of the day depends on how far you’ve spread your pots. If you’ve been hauling pots for 18 to 20 hours and you know you can get from point A to point B in a couple of hours and start hauling again, you are not going to shut the boat down for six hours just so the guys can get some sleep. We regularly do a 30-plus-hour day, but the most I’ve done is three days without sleep. That gets a bit ugly. You get a bit rummy around three or four in the morning.

We have a name for the Alaskan crab season: “animal fishing”, because the guys who work on these boats are animals. They don’t eat or sleep.

When I finally get some sleep, all I dream about is fishing. Sometimes one of my crew will come to wake me and hear me blabbering about bearings and positions. I can’t think of one job that would give me the thrill and sense of accomplishment that I get from fishing. You want to know my biggest fear in life? Not being able to fish.”

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New Livechat Held With Captain Sig Hansen at the F/V Northwestern Website

 

Sig Hansen visiting Ground Zero in New York, 2007. “Photo courtesy of Northwestern Brothers Marketing, LLC. www.fvnorthwestern.com”

Saturday evening at 9pm eastern, the F/V Northwestern Forum web team held their first official livechat with none other then Captain Sig Hansen, himself! 

Due to the overloaded server and huge amount of traffic attempting to access the chat room, what was meant to be a simple question & answer livechat done somewhat a la Discovery- style in that questions were gathered prior to the actual chat, turned into an hour and a half long, free flowing off-the-cuff interview held by both the forum team AND fans! 

This livechat format was set up slightly different then the telephone interviews held by  Discovery throughout the airing of Deadliest Catch season 3.  For this livechat, one of the forum web team members actually met up with Sig Hansen at his home, sat side by side with him throughout the chat, and performed the duties of typist as the skipper responded to the multitudes of questions posed to him.  Approximately an hour into this process, accessing  questions that fans had posted in the days prior to the livechat became impossible, but fortunately the inquisitive Northwestern fans carried on and improvised by asking their favorite captain questions on the spur of the moment and in turn and without skipping a beat, Sig Hansen responded quick and naturally as if he were simply chatting with his crew.

According to the buzz, Northwestern fans had a great time picking Sig Hansen’s brain.  And from the forum team, Sig was so impressed with his fan base that he cannot believe how great his fans are and likewise,  that everything went so smoothly despite the excessive traffic.  Apparently he was as amused with fans as they were with him.

Catch up and learn a bit more about Captain Sig Hansen by reading the transcript!

 F/V Northwestern livechat

Sig Hasen on the F/V Northwestern’s frozen bow during Opilio season, 2007.  “Photo courtesy of Northwestern Brothers Marketing, LLC. www.fvnorthwestern.com”

Sig Hansen Attending BPS Grand Opening: Raising Money for Conservation

Bass Pro Shop grand opening

STAR-STUDDED CELEBRITY CAST JOINS BASS PRO SHOPS FOR SPECIAL EVENING FOR CONSERVATION AND RIBBON-CUTTING CEREMONY Rancho Cucamonga, California–An all-star cast that reads like a who’s who in the world of

Almost Complete – (From top to bottom) Main entrance view of the new Bass Pro Shops in Rancho Cucamonga. Various fish replicas that will be available for sale at the White River Fly Shop. These fish trophies will be on display and were donated by various Bass Pro Shops customers around the country. A view of the trout pool from the store’s second floor.

sports, entertainment and the great outdoors joins together to help Bass Pro Shops celebrate a spectacular Evening for Conservation, Wednesday, July 18th. Among those scheduled to attend will be legendary angler and TV host Jimmy Houston, 9-time Bassmaster Angler-of-the-Year Roland Martin, former NASCAR(r) driver Wally Dallenbach, former LA Rams and Pro Football Hall of Fame member Deacon Jones, former LA Lakers player Flynn Robinson, “Mr. Crappie” Wally Marshall, Captain Sig Hansen featured on Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch,” RedHead Pro Hunting Team member and “First Lady of Hunting” Brenda Valentine, Miss California USA 2007 Meagan Tandy, Miss Rancho Cucamonga Mary Harrison, Miss Teen Upland Sherrie Munson and members of the exciting Lakers Girls.

The new Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World in Rancho Cucamonga is located on the east side of Victoria Gardens Regional Town Center adjacent to the I-15 Freeway. It will officially open its doors for a preview celebration during the fundraising event and ribbon-cutting ceremony Wednesday, July 18th from 6:00 PM to 9:00 PM. The event is free and open to the public.

For every $1 spent during the Evening for Conservation fifty cents will be donated to the “More Fish” campaign of the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to save fish and their habitats for our kids and grandkids. Local conservation groups will sell food and drinks courtesy of Johnsonville(r) and Coca-Cola(r) and may hold raffles with 100 percent of the proceeds benefiting those organizations.

Local conservation groups on hand Wednesday evening include Ducks Unlimited, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, National Wild Turkey Federation, Quail Unlimited, California Deer Association, Safari Club International, Trout Unlimited, California Outdoor Heritage Alliance, The Canada Goose Project, California Department of Fish and Game, Mule Deer Foundation, The California Golden Trout Restoration Project, United Anglers of California, California Waterfowl Association, Cucamonga Valley Water District and Riverside County Habitat Conservation Agency.

Dignitaries invited to attend, but not yet confirmed, include California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bass Pro Shops founder Johnny Morris, Bass Pro Shops President Jim Hagale, Mayor Donald Kurth, M.D., Victoria Gardens General Manager Christine Pham, Rancho Cucamonga City Council officials and Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World General Manager Bob Derr.

Racing enthusiasts won’t want to miss seeing Martin Truex, Jr.’s #1 NASCAR Nextel Cup race car or the #20 Bass Pro Shops Sprint Car. Other special exhibits that evening include the Bass Pro Shops Hot Air Balloon and the exciting Toyota Tundra Outdoor Tour.

The Grand Opening Celebration begins Thursday, July 19th at 8:00 AM and will include special exhibits, more celebrity guests, store wide savings and fantastic giveaways. You can also visit with today’s experts on fishing, hunting, dog training and more. See huge displays from the industry’s top manufacturers and talk with factory reps for answers to your product questions.

The world’s leading supplier of outdoor products is much more than a hunting and fishing store. Part museum, part art gallery, part education conservation and entertainment center, the nearly 180,000-square-foot Bass Pro Shops Outdoor World in Rancho Cucamonga will also offer equipment for hiking, backpacking, camping, outdoor cooking and more. Shoppers will find outdoor apparel for men, women and children, along with a fine selection of outdoor, casual and athletic footwear. A gift and nature shop serves up a wide variety of outdoor-related items from lamps and dishes to bird feeders and furniture.

In addition, the 11,090-square-foot Islamorada Fish Company Restaurant will also open the evening of July 18th and will allow visitors a chance to experience a taste of the Florida Keys with menu selections showcasing bold flavors of seafood dishes, great steaks, hickory-fired rotisserie chicken and exotic appetizers.

Widely recognized for their efforts in conservation and outdoor education, Bass Pro Shops has received more conservation awards than any other outdoors retailer. The store will also offer free Outdoor Skills Workshops for adults, kids and families.

EW’s The TV Stars We’re Loving Now

06/26/07  Entertainment Weekly’s, The Stars We’re Loving Now! 

Home of the Brave
The Discovery Channel’s Adventure Shows

Photography by:  Justin Stephens

NAMES Les Stroud, Mike Rowe, Sig Hansen, and Phil Harris

WHY THEM Whether it’s Stroud coping with the world’s harshest environments on Survivorman, Rowe tackling Dirty Jobs, or Alaskan king crab fishermen Hansen and Harris going after The Deadliest Catch, the quartet risk life, limb, and personal hygiene for our edutainment. (We’d have included Man vs. Wild’s Bear Grylls in the photo, too, if he weren’t climbing Everest!)

THE POWER OF ONE In addition to enduring extreme conditions in such locales as the freezing Canadian Arctic and the scorching canyonlands of Utah, Survivorman’s Stroud also handles all the filming duties. Solo. ”You can’t portray survival and have a crew,” he says. ”How difficult would it be to resist having a bite of someone’s Mars bar?”

HOLD ON TO THAT APPETITE On Dirty Jobs, Rowe investigates such ewww-inducing occupations as sewer inspecting and, in a forthcoming episode, snake wrangling. ”I had a python s— on me,” he says. ”When you’re working your way through the lexicon of poo, if you can pull ‘python’ out of your pocket, you’re pretty much going to trump the conversation.”

CRABS ARE MEANER THAN SNAKES Fishing for crab in the Bering Sea is known as the most dangerous way to make a living, something confirmed on Deadliest Catch. Three seamen perished when a ship capsized. But with the season lasting just weeks, there is little time for mourning. ”You plow on,” says Hansen. ”It affects you later. You’re there to fish.”

WILD YOUTH When Harris was just 17, he ”bulls—ted” his way onto a boat and made around $130,000 in less than a month. What did he do with the dough? ”You want the honest answer? I bought a car, I bought a house, and I bought a couple of hookers.”

SECRET TALENT ”For short periods of time I can create the illusion of great competence,” says Rowe. ”Ultimately, I have no real skill.”

Phil Harris, Sig Hansen, and Mike Rowe on EW

PHIL HARRIS and SIG HANSEN, THE DEADLIEST CATCH

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Alaskan crab fishing has this reputation of being the most dangerous job in the world. But how hard is it really?

PHIL HARRIS: Guys think that they can do that job. And 99.9 percent of the people can’t. The last guy I hired, he was giving me this spiel about how tough he is and the whole bit. And then we got out there and he crawled up on his hands and knees to the wheelhouse, big tears running down his face, and he said, ”Get the Coast Guard out to pick me up — I’m gonna die.”And how demanding are your own responsibilities as captain?
It’s like, if you make a mistake in your job right now — say you screw this interview up — what’s gonna happen? Your boss is gonna say, ”Hey man, you really f—ed this thing up, why don’t you do it again?” I go make a mistake and somebody gets either hurt or killed. There is zero room for error. You have to really, really concentrate and know what you’re doing. You don’t have the luxury of screwing up.Have you been injured a lot while fishing?
I broke my back in two places, I broke both arms, I broke my ankle and my toes, my wrists, you name it. The only thing I haven’t broke basically is my neck.

What do you regard as the essential piece of survival equipment?
A survival suit [combination flotation device and thermal body protector]. That’s mandatory. But when I started fishing we didn’t have survival suits. You were really a tough guy then. Because the guy running the boat told you, ”Hey, if you break your arm, there’s 50 guys at the dock that want your job.” So, you’d fish with a broken arm. Back then it was a lot tougher than it is now. There’s a different breed of kids now that are coming up doing this. Everybody’s sue-happy these days. Back then we didn’t sue boats. You got hurt, you just lived through it. I cut the end of my finger off. Well, so what? You go and get it worked on and you lose the end of your finger, big deal. Let’s go to work. Nowadays, the kids are gonna start a lawsuit and make a big deal of it. They’re not as tough as they used to be.

 

 

HANSEN ”People just walk up and go ‘Hey, Captain, can I have an autograph?’ That blows me away.”

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: What effect has the success of The Deadliest Catch had on your life?
SIG HANSEN: Everywhere I go, people don’t even ask me if I’m Captain Sig. They just walk up and go ”Hey, Captain, can I have an autograph?” That blows me away. And I’ve got a thick stack of résumés from people who want to go [fishing] for free — from doctors to lawyers. You name it. But I don’t want a crew made up of doctors and lawyers. I want the crew I have.

Plus, you have your own website where fans can buy thongs emblazoned with the phrase ”Can’t find ‘em, grind ‘em!”
The people who do the site said, What do you want on there? And I said just be creative. I gave them some slogans and they went and ran with it. It was quite a surprise to me to see [the thongs] on there — I get a kick out of it.

Are they hot sellers?
I think the T-shirts and the mugs are the hot sellers. But we’ve sold a few thongs

***

And Mike Rowe on WHO has the most dangerous job…

MIKE ROWE, DIRTY JOBS

ROWE ”I’m on the crab boat or the oil rig — I just don’t know what the hell I’m doing! I’m NOT okay.”

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Is it true that you were almost the onscreen host of The Deadliest Catch rather than just the narrator?
MIKE ROWE: I worked on the boats and I hosted the first season. And, when we were nearly complete, the network called and said, ”Look, we’re going to go ahead and do Dirty Jobs, congratulations — but you got to pick one. Because they’re gonna be on the same night and we can’t have you telling us stories about six dead fishermen on camera and making a fart joke with your arm in a cow’s ass.”

What’s been your dirtiest dirty job?
For pure disgust, it was probably removing a lift pump out of a waste water treatment plant. Normally, after the crew and I have a day out, we’ll sit down somewhere and have a beer. We couldn’t even talk to each other after this. I was, like, ”Guys, I’ll see you around.” We just went home and tried to forget what we’d seen.

You used to work at QVC? What was that like?
The ultimate dirty job. It’s almost as if I sold out before I had any success to compromise. It’s odd — today I’m the spokesman for Ford and I have this hit show in 128 countries. And it’s weirder than people think. I lecture now at Fortune 500 companies. I go to universities and talk about the changing face of the proletariat in modern-day workplaces and how technology has fundamentally changed the basic sense of what work looks like. You know, people pay me to pontificate on all of this s—! I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like it. I just can’t believe somebody hasn’t called me out for being an imposter yet. People listen, God love ‘em. But then, I do have 150-plus stories to back up any harebrained point I might care to make.

How many different types of animals have you had your fingers on and/or inside over the last couple of years?
I don’t want to overstate it, but… a lot. Most recently, in Montana, I castrated a yak. A yak, for God’s sake! So it’s getting a bit more esoteric. We’ve done 152 different jobs, and animals have been the star of the show, for better or worse.

So who has the most dangerous job out of Les, Sig, Phil and you?
An actuarial accountant would say Sig and Phil. A survival expert would probably say Les. But, all modesty aside, nobody is as unqualified to do the job at hand on a daily basis as me. So, I have the most dangerous job! I’m on the crab boat or the oil rig — I just don’t know what the hell I’m doing! I’m a lumberjack and I’m NOT okay. So I’m going with me.