395.3-Pound Tuna Catch Breaks 16-Year-Old Record

A Los Angeles lawyer apparently has broken the 16-year-old all-tackle world record for yellowfin tuna with a catch of 395.3 pounds.

Dave Manella, who lives in Toluca Lake, caught the fish at Clarion Island off Mexico while on a 17-day trip aboard Frank Lo Preste’s Royal Polaris. If recognized, it will top the record of 388 pounds 12 ounces, caught by Curt Wiesenhutter at nearby San Benedicto Island in 1977.

Last December, Mark Gasich of Costa Mesa caught a yellowfin weighing 399.6 pounds, but that catch was not eligible under International Game Fish Assn. regulations because Gasich had switched line from one rod to another during the fight.

Lo Preste said of Manella’s catch, “It’s a legal fish all the way--one man, one rod.”

Lo Preste did not make the trip. The boat was skippered by Brian Kiyohara, who was on his first 17-day excursion. The trip started with catches of wahoo and smaller tuna at Alijos Rocks, 490 miles south of San Diego, then moved to Clarion Island, where Manella caught his tuna Feb. 19.

The fishing was so good, Lo Preste said, that for the last two days fish weighing less than 200 pounds were released--a total of 131. Sixteen tuna weighed more than 200.

Manella, 43, used a 5 1/2-foot extra-heavy-duty rod rigged with a two-speed reel and 80-pound test line. He was kite-fishing--running his line through a detachable kite away from the boat at the end of the chum line--when the tuna took a large “salami” mackerel.

After its initial run, the fish came directly to the boat, where Manella fought it from the port side for an hour and 25 minutes, from bow to stern.