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“He loved his kids. He loved to ride motorcycles. He loved crab fishing,” said Bryan Damon, a 32-year-old Bay Center crabber.

“It’s fish-or-go-hungry insanity. That area is so compressed that the crab are sucked up pretty fast,” said Dale Beasley, a retired crabber and president of the Columbia River Crab Fishermen’s Association.

In coastal waters some 3 miles beyond the Willapa Bay mouth, crabber Ben Downs, skipper of the Rising Sun, ran into trouble.

Green was now the last Bay Center crabber fishing in the ocean.

For Bering Sea crabber Gretar Gudmundsson, December is a month for preparing his two boats for the winter harvest season.