Author: Francis Meyrick

Chapter 2 -B Your Job Offer: PAY? HOW MUCH and WHEN? (Will you be an employee or a sub-contractor?) There are two different pay structures: 1) straight salary, and 2) pay per tonnage caught. Or a combination of both. 1) Straight salary is exactly that: $3,500 per month. Or $7,000 per month. If the ship…

Moggy’s Tuna Manual Ch.3-A Landing Video discussions There are some great tuna helicopter videos around, and I’m hoping people will send me many more links and photos, so I can include them here. For the purpose of discussion, a few things: 1) remember that the video often doesn’t tell us the whole story about the…

Landing on the Chi Tai 866, 30th January 1998 PART 3 “Moggy’s Tuna Manual ” “Handling your helicopter “ Chapter 3-B Wind, waves, and wild decks Few things can compare with this crazy dare; if you crave the ultimate trip go land, my friend, on a ship, on a wild and stormy deck rolling around…

How NOT to approach a boat – Reasons why explained below… PART 3 “Moggy’s Tuna Manual ” “Handling your helicopter “ Chapter 3-A Different techniques for landing (Been there, done that; been there, done that; oh, yawn….! Boring, boring…. been there…………………….OOPS!?????) In slowly putting together this manual, I have spent some long hours up on…

Approaching the Calipso by Sven A.Saeboe PART 2 “Moggy’s Tuna Manual ” “Job offers and job duties “ Chapter 2-A “Your Job Offer: Legitimate questions you SHOULD ask “ (But have some sympathy with the helicopter owner) So, having read Part 1 of this manual, and seen some interesting articles, in a moment of weakness…

Ch.1-E Herding, and the ‘tow-line’; the Brown Ball, speedboats, netboats, green dye, seal bombs, underwater breathing devices 1) Herding, and the ‘tow-line’; speedboats and net boats. I want to mention at this stage the concept of ‘herding’. We will talk about it again under Section 3 (Handling your helicopter), but for now I want to…

Chapter 1-D Radio buoys, Bird radar, Dirty tricks and Sculduggery 1) Radio Buoys I have already mentioned radio buoys a few times. It is a common tool in the tuna industry. What you have got is basically a long aerial, maybe twelve to fifteen feet high. At the base is a round, circular body, with…

On a low approach to the Hsieh Feng 707; TOO low Chapter 1-C Foamers and Breezers 1) Foamers There are some sights in Nature, which are universally recognized as truly magnificent. Most members of the public are familiar with documentaries showing large salmon migrating up seemingly impossible mountain streams. Their determination to return to their…

Ch.1-B Skipjack, Yellowfin, Bigeye, Albacore, Bluefin, log fishing, purse seiners, longliners, good pilots and dead trees A gift from Mother Nature to Man; will Man prove himself worthy? If you remember from the Introduction, one hapless Irish neophyte tuna pilot on his ‘first trip’ leaned over the rail in puzzlement, asking: “Why is everybody so…