The number of over-80-foot-long groundfish draggers — the big boats — in the Gloucester fleet has just grown by one to six.
Local vessel owner and shore captain Joe DiMaio was responsible again.
Economics, fish regulations, sales and sinkings have down-sized the big-boat dragger fleet component, which once numbered over 30 vessels in the 1980s to its current number.
"You got to take chances in this business," said DiMaio, a gutsy fifth-generation fisherman turned shore captain and vessel owner, who emigrated from Porticello, Sicily, to Gloucester in 1973. Since then, during groundfishing’s many flows and ebbs, especially when other boat owners have either talked about or gotten out of fishing, he’s owned 14 medium- to large-size draggers, including the fleet’s last three new stern trawlers — the 92-foot Italian Princess in 1989, the 92-foot Princess Diana in 2000, and the 99-foot Princess Laura in 2003.