FALMOUTH — NOAA's 208-foot research vessel Henry B. Bigelow was designed and outfitted to improve scientific sampling and provide an accurate assessment of East Coast groundfish populations for the National Marine Fisheries Service. But two of the New England companies that worked together to design and build trawling gear for the $54 million state-of-the-art ship say the nets are too small, which could affect survey results as it gathers critical information about cod, haddock, flounder and other groundfish species in the Northeast fishery.
Net designer Tor Bendiksen, of Reidar's Manufacturing in Fairhaven, who worked on the gear project with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, said industry input only went so far.
"It's an industry-standard net, and fishermen do use the net they are now set up with," he said. "But I have concerns about the size trawl and the size doors compared to the vessel they are using it on.
"A 100-horsepower boat towing a 100-horsepower net is going to catch more fish than a 1,000-horsepower boat towing a 100-horsepower net. The Bigelow is a 3,000-horsepower vessel, and you could very easily overspread the net. We offered them a bigger net design but they had their own parameters."
Gear designer Bob Taber, of Trawlworks Inc. in Narragansett, who also served on a panel formed to design the trawl gear, agreed that the dynamics with such a large vessel are not the same.
"We tried to talk them into a bigger net or using a bridle to mimic a 400-horsepower tow but they said no," Taber said. "It's a fantastic vessel, but the sea characteristics are totally different and it cannot mimic the package that the net and the doors were designed for.
"There is quite a different action on the whole gear compared to what a smaller vessel would be towing."
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