Medical journals are reporting the gruesome tale of a white marlin that speared a Louisiana fisherman as he was reaching over the side of his boat to land the 60-pound fish. As the unnamed 31-year-old angler was trying to unhook it, the fish leapt from the water, its bill driving through the back of the angler’s throat and into the base of his skull.
The fisherman fell back into the boat in excruciating pain. According to The Journal of Emergency Medicine, emergency workers had to rush him to a hospital, where his X-rays didn’t show much. A CT scan, however, revealed that a 1.4-inch tip of the marlin’s bill had broken off the fish and lodged itself in the angler’s spinal canal.
Immediate surgery was required to remove the marlin’s bill-tip fragment. Miraculously, the angler walked out of the hospital eight days later, fully cleared by doctors of any infection or neurological damage.
Hazards of Chasing Billfish
Such scary stories from billfish angling are rare, but they happen every year, and usually without a lot of fanfare or news of the incident.
Mishaps usually occur as anglers and boat crews land giant and high-leaping billfish. Often, a raspy bill from a marlin or sailfish slashes across someone’s arm, usually the person trying to land the fish by its bill or unhooking it boatside.
But speared hands, arms, and other damage do also occur regularly in the bluewater billfish world.
Marlin Dives Aboard
Just last July, a TikTok video showed a wild blue marlin launching itself from The Gulf waters and into the stern of a large offshore trolling boat off Orange Beach, Alabama.
The video begins as the marlin first jumps beside the large Hatteras boat “Jubillee,” and then dives and sails from the water and into the boat’s open-stern cockpit. A crew member trying to handle the fish with the leader is nearly struck by the marlin as it sails into the boat. Then the thrashing and twisting marlin skids across the stern gunnel, passing the crewman with the leader.
In an instant, as the fish slashes with its bill, it collides into another crew member whose back is facing the crazed marlin. That crew member is knocked hard to the boat’s deck, yelling and screaming as the muscular marlin continues its gyrations across the stern gunnel, finally falling back into the water.
The estimated 100-to-200-pound marlin nearly speared the second angler in the back as its long and dangerous bill ferociously slammed him. While the back of his shirt was ripped open wide where the marlin’s raspy bill raised a long, nasty, painful welt, the crew member only sustained a comparatively minor wound.
Catching a Sailfish to the Groin
Sailfish also have had many close calls with fishermen as they’ve been brought in for unhooking. In July 2022, 73-year old Katherine Perkins of Arnold, Maryland, was hurt after an estimated 100-pound sailfish jumped into the boat while anglers battled the high-jumping fish off Stuart, Florida.
The sailfish bill struck Perkins in the groin as she stood next to the boat’s center console. Her angling companions treated her wound and returned to shore, where Perkins was taken to a hospital for treatment and survived.
While Russell Ching was boating in 2015, a 600-pound Hawaiian blue marlin came over the gunnel and stabbed the angler in his leg – incredibly, the bill passed through Ching’s leg without hitting either bone or arteries. An electric saw on board the boat was used to severe the bill; Ching was taken to a hospital and recovered from his wound.
During a fishing tournament in Bermuda some years ago, 32-year-old Ian Card was seriously injured when an 800-pound blue marlin leapt into his boat and impaled him under the collarbone with its bill, the force of the strike knocking him overboard. Card was rescued by crew members and underwent emergency surgery, but also survived.
A 10-foot-long marlin jumped into Jose Mayarita’s fishing boat off Acapulco, Mexico, after he battled the fish for several hours. The fish impaled Mayarita in the chest, and the angler drifted in his boat for days before a helicopter finally located him. While Mayarita was taken to a hospital and recovered, he later died as a result of his marlin billfish injury.
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Boating billfish is when things get dangerous. Anglers try to land marlin and sailfish quickly, so the fish make a fast recovery following release. Sometimes sails and marlin are not quite ready to be drawn close for unhooking, and they leap into boats, twisting, turning and trashing with their bills.
In the offshore angling world – where the fish are big, fast, toothy and mean – being careful is of utmost importance.
