Shoreline Firefighter Featured on Deadliest Catch

To kick off the king crab season aboard the Northwestern, Shoreline resident Mark Peterson bit off the head of a herring--also known as crab bait--for good luck, as the cameras rolled for the hit Discovery Channel show Deadliest Catch last October.

Peterson, a Shoreline firefighter/paramedic and Shorewood High grad was invited to spend 37 days fishing king crab on the Northwestern, one of the seven featured boats on show.

Sig Hansen, one of the show’s stars and a fellow Shorewood grad and Shoreline resident, captains the boat, and his brothers Norman and Edgar are also key members of the crew.

The show’s latest run started April 12 and continues Tuesday at 9 p.m. on Discovery.

“I have no idea how they are going to portray me,” Peterson said. “It’s a little unnerving but it’s fun. My daughter (Brianna) really digs it. She’s a fourth-grader and thinks it's neat to see her dad on TV.”

Peterson worked for about 10 years on the Northwestern and other commercial fishing boats in Alaska before becoming a paramedic and firefighter.

“It’s very weird with those guys running around on the boat with the cameras,” Peterson said. “Not at all what I remember it being like.”

Peterson’s fellow paramedics traded shifts while he was gone. He joined the Northwestern crew while member Matt Bradley was on leave.

Peterson got seasick the first couple of days since it had been about 15 years since he had been on a fishing boat.

“It smelled the same,” he said. “It looked the same.”

Peterson moved to Shoreline in 1985 and got to know the Norwegian Hansen brothers at Shorewood. They fished with their dad, Sverre, who started the Northwestern. Peterson used to clean rust off the boat with them when it was in port in Seattle. He asked several times if he could fish but Sverre told him the boat was full.

But in December 1986, Sig Hansen drove up to the gas station where Peterson was working on Richmond Beach Road and asked if he still wanted to go fishing.

Peterson said, "Yes,” without hestitation.

Within a few days, Peterson packed and headed up to Alaska to work on the Northwestern.

“I had no idea what I was getting into,” Peterson said.

Peterson worked 18- to 20-hour days on the boat in the dangerous waters, with crab pots being hauled on board.

The main variables are the weather and whether you’re catching anything, Peterson said.

“The better the fishing, the more fun,” he said.

The benchmark used to be about $100,000 per crewmember per season.

“Hit that every year,” said Peterson, who came back to Shoreline and bought a house in his early 20s.

“I was proud of it,” Peterson said. “It was super hard, hard work. There was no let up. You fished until the whole quota was gone, not just your quota.”

Peterson--who lives in Richmond Beach with his wife, Lorean; son, Nathan, 14; and daughter, Brianna, 9--said his wife has been supportive, as have his co-workers.

“She knows I like to do different things,” he said.

It’s a hard life at sea and it ages the men who do the job.

Peterson said he has chronically sore shoulders, which might be from repetitive motions like bending over to sort crab.

“I loved doing it when I did it but I knew I didn’t want to do it my entire life,” he said.

Peterson said fishing was like a drug. The crew members would complain a lot while onboard and would be anxious to get home but as soon as they were home they would start planning to go back.

“A lot of guys have done it for a lot of years,” he said. “Now they’re like rock stars.”

A lot of the crab that is collected is purchased by Trident, a major seafood supplier, and much of it is sent to Japan, Peterson said.

Peterson said he and Sig used to argue a lot back in the early days, but he really respected Sig’s dad, Sverre, who died about 10 years ago.

“I was pretty lucky that they invited me to come back,” he said.