Feature

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: i

: Al Brava With cme net drum on stern of vessel ma Nicarguan fishermen.

A Best Wishes

| and Peace

: for 1990,

. | United Fishermen and

Allied Workers Union
Steveston Shoreworkers
Local 8

CUPE LOCAL 561

COQUITLAM SCHOOL BOARD AND
MUNICIPAL LIBRARY EMPLOYEES

Sends Season's Greetings to all
British Columbia trade unionists

SOLIDARITY FOREVER

On Behalf of
our members
and staff -
we extend
Season’s
Greetings.

United Food and Commercial Workers
Local 2000, 379-12th St.,

New Westminster, V3M 4H2

Phone: 525-8811

Nicaragua hoat
project still needs
materials, aid

By DAN KEETON

The 41-foot white fiberglass boat
that crams almost every square inch .
of the makeshift boat shed in North
Vancouver seems ready to sail at a
moment’s notice — all the way down
to the Nicaraguan fishing town of San
Juan del Sur.

In fact, the vessel that has been a
labour of solidarity on the part of
dozens of trade unionists and other
Canadians still has a way to go before
it will sail Nicaragua’s coastal water
and haul a capacity 16,000 pounds of
fish into port, Al Brown cautions.

“This is definitely a case of workers
helping workers,” says the long-time
member of the United Fishermen and
Allied Workers, as he conducts a
Tribune reporter around, and through
the bowels of, the boat that has been
taking shape for the past three years
at the Native-owned Mosquito Creek
marina.

The lanky Brown, who has worked
on the project almost daily since it
started, points out with pride the
steadily accumulating pieces of
equipment that have come in from
Canadians who want to help
Nicaragua in its struggle for self-
sufficiency.

There’s the six-cylinder, 220-horse-
power, turbo-charged 3306 Caterpillar
diesel engine now installed below
deck. And the seven hydraulic
winches with external clutches for
easy maintenance.

And, a source of real wonder, the
flexible couplings and stainless steel
pipe that will make up the boat’s
exhaust system. These come courtesy
of the United Mine, Mill and Smelter
Workers in the mining city of
Sudbury, Ont.

Brown recalls with delight the day
Mine-Mill president Rick Briggs and
other leaders walked into the boat
shed and asked what they could do to
help.

“T couldn’t suggest anything other
than a financial donation, but they
said no, they’d like to do something
more substantial. So they went back
and involved some kids at Cambrian
College, and this is the result.”

Outside, resting along the length of
Brown’s herring skiff, is a new
aluminum mast — "the finest you'll
ever get” — that will carry three types
of phone wires and the lighting for
the ship. Its construction was donated
by the firm, Coast Coppersmiths,
reducing the cost to $2,200 for the
materials, Brown relates.

Inspiration for the Nicaraguan boat
project came from a visit UFAWU
members paid several years ago to
San Juan del Sur, a small town
nestled along the shores of a natural
harbour on the Pacific coast, about 17
kilometres north of Costa Rica.

Brown relates how the delegation
found the fishermen operating a few
derelict vessels, all that remained of a
once-impressive fleet that was
apprehended by the forces of the
fleeing dictator, Anastasio Somoza,
following the 1979 Sandinista
revolution.

The fishing town’s needs sparked a
campaign not only for a boat, but for
nets and other fishing gear, Brown
says.

The vessel under construction will
be light-years away from the aging
rusty fleet that anchors off San Juan
del Sur. It will be operable from three
“stations,” and sport several
motorized operations enabling its
crew to engage in possibly: six
different types of fishing, including
trolling, gillnetting and prawn and
shrimp fishing.

“We're not sure yet about the
gillnetting. They’ve never done it
down there, and there may be too
many sharks in the water” to make
that type of fishing feasible, Brown
says.

The boat is also fitted with a $7,800
steel net drum — an essential item on
all B.C. seiners and gillnetters but
unknown in Nicaragua, where most
nets are still hauled in by hand.

It impressed Roger Romero, head
of the fishing co-operative in San
Juan del Sur, who visited the project
while in Vancouver earlier this month.
Brown says arranging the first-time
visit by a resident of the town “the
best thing we ever did.”

Romero was able to make several
suggestions, including advising that a
14-inch net intended as part of the
gear would be illegal in Nicaragua in
a few months time, part of the
government’s efforts to conserve
fishing stocks.

Brown points out features that
show the boat is being constructed
with sensitivity to Nicaragua’s climatic
conditions. Wooden exteriors are
treated with an oil stain instead of
varnish, which would blister and peel
in the tropical sun. Five-inch thick
foam insulation will keep the hold, -
which Brown says can be washed out
in about 10 minutes, cool in the
blazing heat.

Additionally, the hull of the vessel
below the water line and other parts
will be “flame-coated,” a process that
prevents pitting of the fiberglass by
the saline waters.

When the vessel is ready for sailing,
it will be taken out for trial runs and
will likely visit several ports of call
along the B.C. coast, Brown relates.
Although several “romantically
inclined” volunteers offered to sail it
to Nicaragua’s waters, economics and
political realities dictate that the vessel
will be shipped on the deck of a
freighter or tanker.

Brown reports that an agent for a
major Soviet shipping line has offered
to take the vessel southward.

Several items are still to be
procured, Brown notes, including a
spare propeller — several of the ship’s
parts come in triplicate — anda
large anchor.

Tax-deductible donations for the
“project — a joint effort of the
UFAWU and Tools for Peace — can
be sent to UFAWU-Nicaragua, 111
Victoria Dr., Vancouver V5L 4C4.

Pacific Tribune, December 18, 1989 e 11

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