North Atlantic Fish Co. recently got a surprise, unwrapped Christmas gift with a pair of towering stabilizers — or "sissy sticks" — delivered to its leased dock next to the Felicia Oil Co. Wharf down the Fort.
The gift, which could become a headache for North Atlantic, probably also represents another man's American dream gone kaput — thanks to Northeast coastal federal fishing regulations that only seem to become crazier — and more industry-destructive — every month.
"It just happened," said Jim Stewart Sr., North Atlantic's operational manager, who looked out his office window one day and found himself alarmingly asking, "Is that boat tied to the end of the wharf?"
It sure was — an approximately 87-foot (77-foot waterline length) single-dredge scalloper named the Nha Trang!