Last Cast Of Day Lands Big One Alaskan Fisherman Lands Halibut That Tips Scales At 459 Pounds

A disappointing day of wind and violent seas was coming to an end when Jack Tragis’ fishing rod plunged down over the railing of the Suzanne Marie and stayed there, like it had hooked the bottom of the world.

Then the bottom began to fight back.

“It was kind of like that proverbial, last cast type thing,” Tragis said, after he landed a 459-pound halibut, the largest official sport catch recorded in the history of Alaska. It broke a record that had stood since 1978, when a 440-pound halibut was landed in Icy Strait.

More than 8 feet long and 5 feet wide, the fish also is likely to set the world halibut record, as kept by the International Game Fish Association, said Mike Ward at the state Department of Fish and Game in Dutch Harbor.

Before Tragis’ epic catch, he and his three charter-fishing partners were about to head back to the Aleutian port of Unalaska with a half-dozen medium size halibut on board on June 11. Their fishing vacation had been repeatedly delayed by the elements - a pair of earthquakes, two tsunami warnings, not to mention forbidding gray seas that rendered the best halibut spots beyond reach.

They were fishing within view of the shore, in waters less than 200 feet deep, when Tragis dropped his line for a final chance, the promise of a post-fishing beer more in mind than another fish.

Thirst would have to wait. The crew knew the fish was big when Tragis’s rod bent double and the 210-pound angler had trouble holding the rod. But for a record to be official, the angler had to land the fish himself. So they watched the grizzly battle for two hours before the fish played itself out, succumbing in exhaustion.

Though its muscles were drained of fight, the fish had sheer mass working for it as Tragis, his three friends and a deckhand worked at a rope attached to the gaff, tug-of-war style, horsing the fish over a step at the stern, over a railing and onto the deck.

“The outcome was in doubt for a long period of time,” Tragis said. “There was a real serious stalemate over whether we were going out or the fish was coming in.”

Tragis hadn’t prepared himself for the scene that unfolded on the Unalaska docks when the boat pulled in. Word had filtered through town that a record-breaking behemoth had been landed. People were spread out along the land to see for themselves.

The fish appears bound for the walls of the Grand Aleutian Hotel 907-581-3844. Tragis agreed to donate it to the people of Unalaska, in exchange for a goodly amount of halibut to take home.

Meanwhile, Tragis and his friends were back out on the water. Unalaska has a halibut derby going on. As it happens, Tragis didn’t buy a ticket before his historic catch. Though it won him the right to tell the ultimate fishing tale for years, his halibut earned him no cash.