Ensenada’s Tuna Industry Wonders Why

More than a month after a devastating storm swept this port city, sections of the expansive harbor still resemble a bombed naval port.

In one cove, at least four large tuna-fishing boats lie beached, half-sunk or in other states of immobility, their twisted hulls looking as though they had been thrashed about and smashed asunder by malevolent giants. Gaping holes scar the swaying remains of two huge floating wooden docks. Wreckage litters the rocky shoreline. Like a discarded toy, a disabled tug perches precariously on a bed of stones.

And, in a shipyard farther north, three large tuna-fishing seiners in various stages of disrepair sit in dry dock awaiting refurbishing.

Fleet Took Pounding

The war-like images are the legacy of the vicious storm that struck Southern California and the Baja coast on the morning of Sunday, Jan. 17, battering seaside communities with record winds and tides. But while the storm is a memory for most Californians, the damage to the tuna fleet here was so severe that many still talk about it and wonder whether man--in this case Mexican officials--could have done more to minimize the damage that nature wrought.

Conservative estimates put the damage to vessels and port installations at $100 million; some estimates reach $200 million.

“I think it’s the worst natural disaster to impact (a nation’s) tuna industry that I know of,” said August Felando, president of the American Tunaboat Assn., a U.S. trade group based in San Diego.

All told, 14 tuna seiners--each valued at $3 million to $5 million--were seriously damaged, including as many as five that are considered beyond repair. Officials said the majority, if not all, of the fishing boats--most of them relatively new 1,200-ton vessels--were owned by the government-run Banco Nacional Pesquero y Portuario, known here as Banpesca. The bank has come under fire in Ensenada--Mexico’s principal tuna port--for not having taken steps to avert the disastrous loss.

The boats, which Banpesca had been trying to sell, were all anchored when the storm struck; the wind and surf knocked many vessels from their moorings and pushed them about, leaving some half a mile away or more. The tuna boats were all inactive, which means the impact of their loss on the tuna industry here won’t be felt immediately.

Critics have suggested that the bank should have considered moving the vessels, or at least provided additional staffing to help minimize damage from the storm, which had been predicted. Questions have also been raised about whether the boats were properly anchored and tied down.

“Some say it was a case of negligence,” said Ensenada Mayor Ernesto Ruffo Appel, who formerly managed a fish mill and headed a fleet of anchovy boats. “Everyone knows that the port can be a dangerous place for a boat during a storm. You need to have a captain and a crew on board to be able to maneuver and prevent serious damage.”

While the storm also beached boats and created havoc in coastal areas from Santa Barbara to San Diego, the damage in Ensenada appears to have been the most extensive--and costly.

At the time of the storm, which was accompanied by exceptionally high tides and breakers of up to 25 feet, the tuna boats were manned only by a handful of guards. Despite the forecast, no effort was apparently made to bring in additional crew members who could potentially have taken some precautionary action.

“It was a Sunday; they probably couldn’t find anyone to work,” theorized Ruffo.

Luis Francisco Martinez, the regional director for Banpesca in Ensenada, declined comment on the matter.

Negligence Charged

El Mexicano, the Baja California pro-government daily, published a series of reports on the disaster this month that attributed the damage to “negligence, apathy, (and) inefficiency” on the part of Banpesca. The newspaper documented previous warnings forwarded to bank officials by port authorities concerned about potential storm damage to the vessels, some of which had been sitting in the harbor for as long as two years.

Mexican authorities have tended to place the blame purely on the unpredictable elements. During the storm, they said, the winds here reached hurricane ferocity, topping 74 miles an hour. While meteorologists forecast high winds, no one counted on such severe blasts.

“It was an unfortunate incident, but it was a natural phenomenon, and wasn’t the fault of any person,” said Carlos de Alba Perez, deputy chief of the Mexican Ministry of Fishing office in Ensenada. “The boats were anchored and tied down well, it’s just that the conditions were very bad.”

Others see it differently.

“We think there was definitely negligence,” said Victor Manuel Romero Johnson, president of a federation of fishing cooperatives in Ensenada. “We saw the evidence every day. There was hardly anyone manning the boats.”

The storm dealt a dramatic blow to Mexico’s tuna-fishing industry, an important source of foreign currency in debt-plagued Mexico. Last year, industry experts said, tuna generated some $100 million in sales, most of it in exports, particularly to Europe. The damaged boats represent a significant percentage of the nation’s 85 or so tuna boats, most of which are based here. The tuna industry accounts for as many as 4,000 jobs in Ensenada, including fishermen, port workers, truck drivers and other related workers.

A decade ago, the Mexican government embarked on an ambitious and costly effort to expand its tuna fleet, which is now among the world’s largest and most modern. However, declining world tuna prices blunted the expected returns of the government-subsidized expansion effort, leaving Mexico with excess tuna-fishing capacity. The industry’s doldrums explain why the 14 damaged boats were in government hands, sitting in the harbor: Many had been repossessed from owners who couldn’t turn a profit, analysts said.

Tuna Prices Are Up

In a cruel irony, however, recent upward trends in tuna prices have buoyed the industry, here, in the United States and in other nations. The Mexican bank was said to be on the verge of selling a number of the vessels when the storm struck.

“These boats were finally ready to go, and then this happens,” said one U.S. expert who follows the Mexican tuna industry, but who asked not to be named. “It’s a major loss.”

Despite the severity of the damage, tuna industry representatives here stress that the effects will not be immediate, as no active tuna boats were damaged. Instead, the storm’s most severe impact is likely to be a slowing of the anticipated future expansion of the tuna-fishing industry.

All of the damaged tuna boats were insured, but authorities said that the coverage is unlikely to pay for the complete cost of repairs. The Mexican government must pick up the tab for extensive damage to port facilities, such as breakwaters, docks, jetties, warehouses and other public installations. Repair work is expected to continue all year.

Meantime, many here remain incredulous about the devastation.

“How could the winds have caused so much damage?” asked an Army officer at the port, himself a native of the Mexican state of Veracruz, where the specter of howling norteno winds are as commonplace as the massive petroleum tankers that cruise the nearby Gulf of Mexico. “We have strong winds in my home, but I’ve never seen anything like this.”