Friday, October 2, 2015

Sanity Break: Sestina

I've been doing some research since the last post, on other disappearances and general treatment of observers as well as other things currently happening in various fisheries. I'm frankly horrified, and having some trouble organizing my thoughts well enough to write a coherent post about it.

So I walk away for a while, and work on some poetry instead. The piece below is a sestina (which is an extremely complex poetry form) that is and is not about Keith's disappearance. Which is to say that it was inspired by this tragedy, as well as a couple others that have happened in the past few years: a boat sinking, and a deckhand who was lost and whose body was never recovered.

Cry of the Banshee

I thought you'd be there when the ship came in to shore
But they came, and you were nowhere to be found.
They told me you'd been taken by the sea
As if she loved you, just as you loved her.
I knew in my heart, when I heard the wail on the wind
Of the banshee, a hag screaming in the darkness.

So now you will dwell in perpetual darkness
And I will walk forever on the shore
And when at night I hear a cry on the wind
I'll know that yet another will not be found.
For everyone who sets sail upon her
Knows that they may not return from sea.

I could wish you'd never gone away to sea
Only to be swept away, down into deep darkness
But your love was always first for her
And she does not free all to walk again on shore.
Though some will be, some will not be found
And ever the banshee cries upon the wind.

The voice of nightmare carries on the wind
Cries out of those lost in the dark places of the sea
For she is hungry, and they will not be found
But by the lantern-fish, and those who live in darkness.
No tale of you, no song will reach the shore;
She called you like a lover and now you lie with her.

And so you will transform, become a part of her
As was foretold when I heard wailing on the wind.
She screamed your name upon a midnight shore
And I knew that you were lost forever to the sea.
I thought that I might drown in my own darkness
And that perhaps I never would be found.

If it should ever come to pass that you are found
I'll go down to the water and I'll thank her
For not keeping you forever locked in darkness.
I've come to fear the cry heard on the wind
When anyone I love goes out to sea;
Still I will listen as I walk upon the shore.

Down in the darkness and far from the shore,
Where never the wind nor the light may be found,
Lie those who once loved her, now one with the sea.

Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Find Keith Davis!

A word about this entry: I've been meaning to start a blog for some time now, and have been told that I should probably have one. I never intended to start it out like this. I am promoting this entry heavily and in a manner that I normally would not; this is not about me. This is about a friend who has vanished, an apparent cover-up of the circumstances surrounding his disappearance, and an attempt to get the story some attention so that we might bring pressure to bear on the relevant authorities to find some answers for his friends and especially for his family.

My friend Keith Davis has been missing at sea since September 10th, and the circumstances of his disappearance are unusual and highly suspect. Now, the Panamanian authorities appear to be interfering in an investigation being conducted by the US Coast Guard and FBI into his disappearance.

Keith is a colleague as well as a friend; we met in Dutch Harbor, Alaska while we were both working as fisheries observers assigned aboard crab vessels. Inevitably, over the course of a few seasons, we spent a fair amount of time together in port. We became friends pretty quickly, having a good bit of common ground, and had some wonderful experiences together.

Keith is one of the most stellar human beings I have ever known. He is gentle and kind, and passionate about his work. He also helps other people whenever and wherever he can. Not long ago, he was involved in raising money for the people of Nepal – a place that he loves – after the earthquakes there. He is a world traveller, smart, savvy, and resourceful, and I have enormous respect for him. And now he has simply vanished, with no explanation, no rhyme or reason, and to all appearances, the authorities do not want the circumstances of his disappearance uncovered.
He was working on a large transshipment vessel, the Victoria No. 168, a ship taking on loads of tuna from longliner fishing vessels while underway to its final destination. His employer is MRAG (Marine Resource Assessment Group) Americas’ Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission (IATTC) Transhipment Observer Program.

Observers have died on these vessels before. Their deaths have been ruled suicides or accidents, but anybody who works in this job has no illusions about how easy it would be for a crew to stage such a thing. It is, after all, a dangerous occupation, involving a great deal of time at sea under all conditions as well as working around heavy moving objects and machinery. And we all know that circumstances sometimes arise when the presence of an observer might be enough of a problem to warrant getting rid of them by any means necessary.

At the time of Keith's disappearance, they were about 500 miles east of Lima, Peru. The second mate on the Victoria 168 (flagged in Panama) stated that he saw Keith at 14:50 local time on Thursday, September 10th onboard the ship. That is the last known sighting of him. At the time, he was monitoring a catch transfer from fishing vessel Chung Kuo No. 818 (Taiwanese, flagged in Vanuatu). The transshipment was completed at 16:05 and at about 16:15 Keith could not be found to sign the transshipment declaration.

The Chung Kuo No. 818 then departed. This should not have been permitted, and strikes me as highly irregular while there was a missing person, particularly an observer. They claimed that they were going to join the search in the water.

The seas were said to be calm that day. Keith and I have had several discussions about safety, and he told me that he always wears his lifejacket on deck (not all of us do, particularly in calm weather). If he went into the water in calm seas while a transfer was taking place, and thus the boats were more-or-less-stationary, they should have found him almost immediately. Furthermore, this is not a guy who would simply fall off a boat, particularly in calm water. He had a couple decades' experience working as on observer, and often in far more dangerous seas. He worked on the decks of crab boats in the Bering Sea during storms, and (as we all do) considered it just another day at the office.

The captain of the Victoria No. 168 initiated a search at 16:30. Ultimately, the search involved approximately 15 vessels, and covered 84 square miles of ocean in a search pattern developed based on size and drift patterns. The search concluded after 72 hours had passed, as is usual. No trace of Keith was found.

Around this time, Keith's family received conflicting reports of what may have happened to him. At one point, they were told that he fell and hit his head, but were later told simply, “We don't know.” If he had fallen and hit his head, why was he not recovered? A statement like that implies that someone saw it happen – in which case he should have been pulled from the water (assuming he fell into the water in the first place) and given appropriate medical treatment. Had he hit his head hard enough to kill him instantly, his body still should have been recovered and returned to his family. None of this was done, which makes the entire story unlikely at best.

The Victoria No.168 was then ordered into port in Panama. However, the fishing vessel was not ordered into port, nor was it located and boarded. This strikes many of us in the observer community as strange; there may have been witnesses on that boat, or some kind of evidence. Both the transshipment vessel and the fishing boat really should have been boarded and searched in international waters, then accompanied back into port for a more thorough investigation. Nobody seems to be quite sure as to why this was not done in this instance.

The treatment of observers is often poor, but this is highly dependent on the fishery. The boats in the Alaska fisheries generally treat observers pretty well, although I am aware of a couple of incidents in which an observer was attacked by crew, and a certain degree of harassment is a regular part of the job, although it is illegal. Even up there, we all have stories.

The Northeastern fisheries are another matter entirely; observers have had their lives threatened, have been confined, berated, harassed, assaulted, and in one case an observer was thrown overboard in the middle of the night. A woman I know who worked in those fisheries once barricaded herself into her cabin until the boat got to port, because her crew was threatening to kill her – and she believed them.

Transshipment vessels are possibly the most dangerous vessels of all. They operate out of various countries, and are often owned by people in one country but flagged in another. Trips are long, spanning weeks. There is contact with a great many fishing boats (usually longliners) and limited communications with shore. All of Keith's communications had to go through the captain, which meant there was really no way he could have tipped someone off to whatever was going on there.

The job of the observer on these vessels is to monitor transfers of fish from the fishing boats, and to document any violations of the law. There are huge amounts of money at stake – particularly in the tuna industry – and an observer's report can potentially cost a vessel quite a bit in fines, or even lead to jail time for the captain and/or crewmembers if the offense is severe.

It is significant that Keith mentioned to his father in an email earlier in the trip that he felt “uncomfortable” on board. That jumped out to me as a huge red flag, because Keith would have known that his communications were almost certainly being monitored, and it isn't the kind of thing he would say unless he felt really unsafe on that ship. He would not have been able to say more than that. To me, knowing what I know of Keith and of the vessel he was on, that one word was just short of a distress call.

Moreover, sometimes the boats are packing more than tuna. Shark fins, for example, may be concealed among the fish. Shark finning is illegal, but extremely lucrative, and the trade in fins remains strong; it is estimated that 200,000 sharks are killed every day, primarily for their fins. Drugs, too, may be transported in or among fish. And these activities, if discovered, could easily put the life of an observer in danger.

I strongly suspect that observers are sometimes bought off, paid to look the other way while illegal activities are taking place. I know bribes are sometimes offered, even in the Alaska fisheries when relatively little is at stake, and suspect that at least one of my colleagues accepted one. One of my own captains once tried testing the waters with me a bit, in case he stood to lose some money on a load; fortunately, it did not come to that, though I did want to see how much he would offer, so I'd know what I was turning down. Then I would have reported him. But if the cost of not accepting a bribe may be your life, I understand why some would choose to do so. I also know that Keith is far too conscientious to take hush money. I don't know if that was the case in this instance; that is pure if somewhat informed speculation on my part, and is but one possible scenario.

What I do know is that the boat arrived in port on Sunday, and was boarded by Panamanian authorities, who then allowed an American tech investigator on board. The American authorities were allowed to download some – but not all – of the information on Keith's laptop before the Panamanian authorities seized not only the laptop, but all of Keith's personal belongings as well. This would almost certainly have included his journal, as he kept one religiously, if it was present. I have not heard whether or not they recovered his logbook. If there are clues to his disappearance, those are the most likely places that they would be found, and the Panamanian authorities won't allow the Americans access to them.

Additionally, the American investigators have a “person of interest” in the case, and they have not been allowed to interview said person. The Panamanian authorities are actively hindering the investigation – why? Just what the hell is happening that a foreign government appears to be willing to assist in covering it up?

We - Keith's friends, family, and colleagues - have far too many unanswered questions, and would appreciate any assistance you might be able to offer in terms of spreading this story far and wide, in hopes that we might bring enough pressure to bear to get some answers. 

#findkeithdavis

UPDATE: According to Keith's employer, the US authorities were, in fact, able to search Keith's computer and make images of the drives before the Panamanians took it back. Still no word about his logbook or journal. They say the Panamanians are cooperating with the US, and that interviews are still being conducted. I'm not sure why his family has or had different information. I honestly don't know what to think about this.

They also made contact with the fishing boat, although evidently they did not get anything beyond confirmation that Keith was there at some point during the fish transfer.

FURTHER UPDATE: There is a great deal of confusion regarding the investigation. I have been getting information from Keith's family, but the information that they are receiving may not always be correct. I want to emphasize the fact that the Panamanian government does seem to be cooperating with the American authorities, and the investigation is continuing. Last I heard, the ship was still in port. Everyone involved in this situation is doing the best they can, considering the difficulties inherent in getting information from official channels and the emotional devastation on the part of Keith's family.

Correction: I had the vessel listed as Vitoria No. 128; the correct designation is Victoria No. 168. This has been corrected in the text.




Some links to a few stories already out there:

CNN Politics

WCBV5, Boston


 birdlife.org-Disappearance of Fisheries Observer from Vessel in the Pacific Ocean.pdf

Introduction

Hi!

My name is Lynn Goodman. I consider myself to be something of a Renaissance grrl, holding degrees in both studio art (sculpture) and biology, as well as being a writer.

I work as a fisheries observer in Alaska, though as of this writing I have been off work for over a year due to an injury sustained on the job and the willful incompetence of the people at the Federal Office of Worker's Compensation Programs. I hope to get back to it this winter.

What is an observer? Quite simply, my job is to monitor catch and bycatch (anything not being targeted by the vessel), weigh and measure a lot of fish, and sometimes sex the fish and take samples - either genetic samples and/or otoliths, which are fish ear bones that grow in rings like trees, allowing the age of the fish to be determined. I have also worked in the crab fishery, where most of my job consists of identifying, sexing, and measuring crab, as well as monitoring bycatch.

The goal of all this, in the end, is to provide data to those managing the fishery in order to allow them to make better management decisions to keep the fisheries sustainable.

I also document any violations of the law and report these to my superiors for action (if it is deemed necessary). This can, at times, put me in a rather awkward position in relation to the captain and crew.

I live on whichever boat I am working on at the time, and am often bunked in with one to three or four of the crew, who are almost universally men. A certain level of harassment goes with the territory, although it is illegal and I am supposed to report it. The reality is that almost none of us ever do so, and only in the more extreme cases.

Since I mostly work in the Bering Sea, the weather is frequently nasty, with big seas. I generally won't stay in regardless of the weather - if the guys are fishing, I'm taking my data, unless the captain orders me off deck because he feels that it is not safe for me to be there. This almost never happens. Usually I have a reasonably safe place to work on deck, and eyes on me.

I love my job. I miss it like crazy. Most of all, I miss the sea. It is the only place where I have ever really known peace, and being landlocked, as I am now, is hell.

As stated, I also write and make art. I've been doing some freelance copy writing and blogging of late, and will continue to try to grow that business. Additionally, I am working on a novel that I started on one of the last boats I worked on, and at any given time I usually have at least one short story in the works. I'm just starting to shop some of my work around. I've actually been writing since I was a child, but have only recently gotten serious about it.

I'm making a little bit of art, too. Unfortunately, I lack good space to work in, and have a limited number of tools, so I can't necessarily produce the kinds of pieces that I'd really like to. But I enjoy creating, nonetheless.

This blog will talk about a great many topics - adventures, writing, art-making, and whatever else may be relevant to me at the time. If you enjoy it, by all means invite your friends to stop by.