Deadliest catch what do they catch

From there it rests, or soaks , for a period of 24 to 48 hours or more, collecting crabs that are hungry for some cod. After the pots soak, the captain navigates the boat back to the beginning of the string of pots, and the crew begins to haul in the catch. When the buoys are spotted, a deckhand throws a grappling hook attached to a rope to grab the short length of rope that's suspended between the buoys.

This rope is also attached to the pot's shot. A deckhand pulls the rope on board and attaches it to a mechanical winch , which hoists the pot up and onto the hydraulic lift. One of the more dangerous parts of this job is managing the heavy, swinging pots.

Bad weather tosses them around like cardboard boxes, and it's up to the deckhand to grab and secure the pot onto the lift. The lift tilts the pot up at an angle and a deckhand opens the trap door. The crabs spill out onto a large metal table, and the crew very quickly sorts them according to size. Only adult male king and opilio crabs can be kept, in order to keep the crab population strong. Failure to adhere to the adult size restrictions results in fines, so it's important that the crew only holds onto the keepers.

As the crabs are sorted, the small ones and the females go back into the ocean, and the keepers are sent through a hole in the deck to a saltwater holding tank that keeps the crabs alive for delivery. Even though the show is called "Deadliest Catch," it may not be the most deadly commercial fishing adventure around.

Dungeness boats aren't required to perform a Coast Guard safety inspection to get a permit. Of the 23 vessels that were lost between and , only three had the voluntary inspection performed. There's also been a reticence to initiate a quota system similar to the one in Alaska.

This keeps the waters crowded with inexperienced captains and small boats, which helps to keep the Dungeness industry the deadliest of them all [source: The Oregonian ]. One of the most treacherous aspects of the Bering Sea is the weather. The king and opilio crab seasons in Alaska are in October and January when the weather isn't kind. Strong winds, storms, snow and ice pummel everything in the boats' paths, tossing them back and forth over to foot 6- to meter waves. The weather also brings ice -- the arch enemy of a fishing boat.

In temperatures between zero and 20 degrees Fahrenheit minus 17 and minus 6 degrees Celsius , ice can build up fast and cause a boat to become extremely unstable. A full load of iced-over crab pots can add an additional 45 tons 41 metric tons to the overall load, and that doesn't even count the ice built up on the boat itself.

For this reason, during icy weather the crew is constantly using sledgehammers to break any ice buildup. Another danger is falling ice. There's a lot of overhead equipment on a crab boat that can freeze over. If the sun comes out, and the ice begins to melt, look out for falling ice. A pound kilogram ice block dropping from 20 feet 6 meters up could easily kill a deckhand.

Ice can also form at sea as ice packs. A surface temperature of Freezing sea spray collects on these frozen surfaces, and the ice pack actually connects and grows into one large iced-over surface.

Ice packs can grow up to 25 square miles 64 square kilometers per day. Besides the inherent dangers of moving a boat through icy waters, the ice can also trap the buoys and crab pots underneath it and send them up to miles kilometers from where they were dropped. Another deadly aspect of the job is the sheer exhaustion the crew faces. When the fish are biting, the captains are relentless, pushing their crews to work as long as two days straight without sleep. Couple that with backbreaking work and a boat that's constantly being tossed back and forth with large waves washing over the rails, and you have a recipe for disaster.

Tired workers can get careless, and carelessness can mean the difference between life and death. If your leg gets caught in a line of rope, you could be pulled overboard. If you're feeding a bait-cutting machine and look away, it can suck your arm in. If you're drowsy, you might not see that pot swinging your way and get crushed like an egg. You get the picture. To make crab fishing safer, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game has instituted a quota system. In the past, there were too many boats at sea competing for the same crabs.

Up to boats in all shapes and sizes battled each other each fishing season derby style, meaning each boat was permitted to catch as many as it could within a set period of time. It simply got too crowded. Now, each boat is only permitted to catch a certain amount, and the number of boats has dropped to about Quotas vary by boat, depending on size and fishing history. For some inside information on the show's production, toss the keepers into the tank and click forward to the next page.

Pulling off a show like "Deadliest Catch" is no pleasure cruise. The entire film crew usually arrives about a week before fishing season begins, most times even beating the boats to Dutch Harbor. During this time, the camera crew does any lead prep that it can -- checking and rigging cameras, taking inventory of tape stock and making sure everyone is up to speed on safety training and gear.

The boats have at least four remote cameras attached to various parts of the vessel, so when they arrive, it's a mad scramble to get onboard and start rigging. Contrary to what some viewers think, the camera crew doesn't jump into in a water taxi at the end of every day and get shuttled back to a warm hotel room. The camera crew lives on the boat for the entire crab run, usually from three to five weeks.

Quarters on these boats are tight, so the captains don't allow more than two film crew members onboard. When his own dog died, he was heartbroken and felt like he Danger at every turn, high stakes, and compelling characters.

In , when the Deadliest Catch first premiered on the Discovery Channel, people were instantly drawn in to the show. The documentary series shows the harrowing ventures that Alaskan fisherman go through in their quest to fish for top tier crab in the Bering Sea. Between storms, heavy equipment, and the turbulent waters, there is natural danger to the job these men take on, and the cameras are there to catch it all. Sig Hansen. Getting to know the camera crew.

Johnathan Hillstrand. Andy Hillstrand. Into the storm. Environmental effects. Josh Harris. Elliot Neese. Unhappy Alaskans. Keith Colburn. Scott Campbell Jr. The lawsuit. Edgar Hansen. Brad Petefish. Firework mishap. The real dangers of fishing. Different voice overs. Fear the moon. Is it the deadliest? Jake Harris. Like father, like daughter. Getting the shot. Diving in to the virtual world.

Tragedy off set. Everything you wanted to know about the placebo effect Have you ever been to the doctor and been prescribed medicine for that aching back, that sore Like so many other reality television shows out there, Deadliest Catch has been accused of using scripts while filming.

One of the boat captains claimed that much of the drama seen on tv is all written into scripts for the cast, not authentically happening between the fisherman. Think of all the wild moments we have seen on this show? Now consider that many of these significant moments were reshoots. Nothing will throw reality television authenticity into question like a bunch of reshoots! The fishermen spend a lot of time having to go back and redo a scene for the cameras.

Reality television commercial fishing is made to look isolated, but chances are, no matter what you see on the t. The show makes it look like three ships are taking the wild waters on when really there are hundreds out there. Even with heavy scripting and controlled scenes, accidents happen. The show often makes minor accidents seem like really major events because reality television only works if the drama factor is high.

The cast members sometimes have to tap into their true acting skills to make a twisted ankle look like a gruesome event. Cast members of reality television show rarely get to choose how they are portrayed in the final television product. There are at time blazing arguments between crew but also humour provided with the pranks the men play on each other and the initiation rituals that greenhorn rookie crew members endure.

Wizard and Northwestern, two of the ships from Deadliest Catch. Although deadliest catch is not entirely relevant to British viewers in terms of the species caught it is still highly entertaining viewing. There are moments of total drama and humour in every episode, and once you get to know the personalities of the captains and crew of each vessel the show becomes even more engrossing.