In the early morning of 30 July, the 8 crew members of the central region’s largest fisheries support ship, DNa 90444 from Da Nang’s Hai Chau District, were busy loading supplies of ice, fuel, food and other necessary provisions ready for their next trip to Viet Nam’s territorial waters.

At noon the ship left the city’s Tho Quang fishing wharf and headed out into Da Nang Bay.  By 2.00am on 31 July, the ship had arrived at the Hoang Sa fishing grounds, about 140 nautical miles off the coast of Da Nang.  At that time, there were many offshore fishing boats from localities in the central region operating nearby.

Loading ice onto fishing boat QB 91557

The supply ship then bought freshly-caught seafood directly from fishing boat QB 91557 from Quang Binh Province’s Dong Hoi City, and supplied provisions for this fishing boat in exchange.  Baskets of fresh scad fish were loaded into the seafood storage compartments of the fisheries support ship.  Meanwhile, 10kg of ice, along with 3 cases of canned beer, 10kg of pork, 2 bundles of vegetables and 300 litres of oil from the supply ship were sold to the fishing boat.  The trade in seafood and provisions between the 2 vessels created a “mobile market”, demonstrating the bustling and busy atmosphere out in the fishing grounds.

Loading baskets of fresh scad fish onto the fisheries support ship

Following this, the supply ship continued its journey to other areas in Viet Nam’s territorial waters to buy more seafood and supply provisions for fishing boats operating there.  At a location near China’s Hainan Island, the support ship bought more fresh scad fish from other fishing boats from Quang Binh Province which had used Seine and drag nets to catch the fish.  The owners of these fishing vessels were very pleased with their continuous bumper catches of scad fish, and they wanted to quickly sell their catches in order to continue their work in this scad fishing season.

After its 3-day trip to the Hoang Sa waters and elsewhere along the central coast, the supply ship returned to Da Nang with a total of over 20 tonnes of scad fish from 10 fishing boats, all of which will be sold to local seafood traders.