After the last MAAC monthly completion, where YPM took out the Juniors for the second month running, the Hornet had taken on a lot of water.  The bilge pump was accidentally left on overnight and blew up so there was no more fishing until the source of the water was found.  A good search for the source revealed a large crack in the keel and there was no option but to get it fixed.

A plea for help to a well-known FW member and a recommendation of an expert marine fabricator was received.  The initial advice was that keel cracks don’t just happen and that the boat must be stripped back to find out why.  Good advice, which we followed, and when it was pulled apart the picture was not pretty.  Lots of structural cracking in the ribs and repair was essential.  In real terms, the hull was probably a write off.  We will leave the cause but let’s just say that some of the cracks were quite old.

The fabricator is a very keen fisho but all of the experience is catching awesome pelagics around Exmouth, with some monster Sambos and Macks in Perth, but with limited success on demersals and  in particular the pinks.  After inspection, we struck a deal whereby he would fully repair the hull, and many other things that needed doing, for a very reasonable price if I would pass on the techniques that we had used to catch pinks in Perth waters.  What a good deal as the Hornet is a “dream boat” to fish off and a new hull would have cost a lot.

The last two weekends have been some of the best winter fishing conditions I have seen.  Stuck at home with no boat wasn’t easy but the knowledge that the boat was being fixed properly got me through.  It was good to read the excellent reports of Member’s  success over the period, but I would rather have been out there.

The repair job was awesome.  Along the way we also improved the Hornet by placing safety gear in easy reach, giving a lot of “love” to the Minn Kota replacing non water proof elements including an on-board battery charger, and repairing everything else.  The boat was picked up on Friday in a very good state.

So, to get out there.  My part of the deal was to take him out to catch a “legal” pink and after a couple of weeks off the water we were keen as.  A trip was planned for Saturday morning, subject to weather.  At 5am Saturday it was crap.  A flurry of text messages from 5am postponed with a commitment to watch the weather.  To our surprise, and against the forecast, it improved during the day and whilst not ideal, a midday launch seemed feasible.

Given the “desire to go” we headed out.  Conditions were not perfect, as they rarely are, but a slow trip out about 5 miles got us to a spot I had marked a few months ago with pro cray pots on it.  The rest is history.  We had a great afternoon and pulled in 25kg of quality.  It was an excellent effort of perseverance by the “expert repairer” to fish our pink technique relentlessly, "out of hours", whilst we were doing well with other techniques for different species.  To his credit, the pink did come along midafternoon and although it was not a monster it was “legal”.  How good is that – WA fishing for us continues to produce and we now have a fishing mate for life.  I think the boat was happy!

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