Fishermen return to sea after stormy days

KUANTAN: The coastal fishermen of Kampung Berserah, near here, have resumed their fishing activities after the weather turned for the better.

A check early yesterday found that the fishermen had started to make preparations to resume fishing activities today by loading up fish containers and ice onto their boats.

Fisherman Aziz Razali, 45, said the fishermen in the village had decided to go to sea due to the good weather.

“The wind has eased and the waves are also moderate. So, we feel we can go out to sea after almost eight days.

“We will also check the Malaysian Meteorological Department’s report before making a final decision later,” Bernama reported him as saying.

Aziz said the sea was turbulent with huge waves from Tuesday until Friday, believed to be due to tropical storm Pabuk on the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia.

The storm was driven by 40kph to 50kph winds and pushing waves up to 3.5m.

“The sea was most turbulent on Thursday. We dared not go out fearing a storm might occur when we were far out at sea,” he said.

Azmi Mohd, 39, said he stayed ashore for more than a week. He repaired his net and made additional fish traps.

The Malaysian Meteorological Department said Pabuk was in the Gulf of Thailand and was expected to be in the waters off Phuket and North Malacca Straits until today and would also affect Perlis, Kedah and Penang.

It was reported that a fisherman was killed and another went missing when their boat capsized off Pattani province when Pabuk hit the south coast of Thailand on Friday, uprooting trees and power poles and swamping some places with water up to 50cm to 100cm deep.

The storm hit the Pak Phanang district of Nakhon Si Thammarat province, where trees crashed down on houses, causing widespread damage.

More than 100 foreign tourists were rescued on Friday from an island off Phuket.