A New Hampshire fisherman hauled in a 1,116-pound bluefin tuna on an overnight trip out of Rye Harbor, smashing the state record by 154 pounds.
Brandon McGirl made the catch during a rough overnight run from Rye Harbor near Portsmouth, close to the Maine border, with Captain Jamie Savage. The bluefin was so large the crew could not lift it from the water at sea and had to trail it back to the dock before hauling it out.
Breitbart News reported that once the fish cleared the water, the size was obvious.
Savage described the moment at the dock.
"We lifted it out of the water and immediately knew it was way bigger than what we thought and bigger than anything either of us had seen before,"
McGirl said the weather did them no favors.
"It was very difficult conditions to try and fish. It was a little bit rougher than we were hoping for,"
He added a fisherman’s truth that held up on this trip.
"They never come when you expect them to come,"
The 1,116-pound bluefin beat New Hampshire’s prior mark by 154 pounds. Earlier benchmarks in state waters included an 865-pound fish in 2001 and a 2013 landing by the crew of the Salt Shaker out of New Castle.
McGirl is keeping the tail as a trophy. The rest of the tuna is going to market, with Japan the likely destination.
That is the working end of a commercial bluefin catch: hard hours on the water, a record fish, a dockside weigh-in, and a sale into a global market that still pays for quality protein pulled from cold New England waters.
No agency certification details were included in the initial account, and the calendar date was given only as Saturday on an overnight trip. What was clear was the weight, the harbor, the captain, and the simple fact that the fish dwarfed what McGirl and Savage had seen before.
Big fish still go to the men willing to work overnight in rough water, not to the loudest press conference.
