Max Mourmouras is a 27-year-old merchant marine who lives in Biddeford, Maine, and works crewing oil tankers on the West Coast. But when he’s home in Maine he spends his time on the water fishing – usually alone.
He targets bluefin tuna offshore in the Atlantic near Saco Bay aboard his 32-foot boat “Retreviah.” Mourmouras has caught a couple big bluefins this year, including a 600-pounder. So, he knows how to solo catch giant fish. But he’s never landed a fish quite like the one he hooked on the afternoon of August 21.
Mourmouras was fishing 10 miles offshore in 200 feet of water, when a different top-predator gamefish took his 18-inch squid bait, which was intended for tuna and suspended halfway to the bottom.
“At first I thought it was a shark, but 20 minutes into the fight it jumped 70 yards from my boat,” Mourmouras tells Outdoor Life. “You never forget something like that.”
Mourmouras had his boat anchored with its line tethered to a surface ball float so he could quickly detach it and chase any big fish that he hooked.
“I never fought something like that,” he says. “Unlike tuna it stayed up near the surface, as I fought it with my heavy-duty 130-class tackle.”
Mourmouras had to leave his anchor and chase the broadbill, maneuvering around other fishing boats in the area. The broadbill stayed in relatively shallow water of 200 feet. Mourmouras battled it for 90 minutes, keeping directly above it during the fight to maintain control of the massive fish.
There are frightening stories of swordfish charging boats, and even spearing their transoms and whacking propellers. However, Mourmouras’ broadbill wasn’t aggressive toward the angler and “Retreviah.”
“It was hard to maneuver the fish compared to tuna,” the angler says. “Finally, I harpooned it with a detachable dart head. But when I pulled on the line to the dart, it came out. So I had to battle it again with my rod to get it close again for another harpoon.”
About 30 minutes later Mourmouras struck the swordfish with a second harpoon with a detachable dart head, which works much like a flying gaff for other big gamefish species such as marlin.
“I slowly pulled him close to my boat and I got a tail rope around it,” he says. “Once I had him with a dart line and tail roped, plus my fishing line, I had control of the fish and called my friend Tim O’Brien for help. He was nearby fishing for tuna on his boat.”
O’Brien assisted Mourmouras to get his massive broadbill swordfish aboard “Retreviah.” Then Mourmouras headed in, taking his fish to Norwoods Marina in the town of Saco. The fish was weighed on certified scales at 529 pounds, and officials from Maine’s Department of Inland Fisheries were on hand to inspect Mourmouras’ rare shallow water swordfish catch.
Mourmouras has submitted an application to the state for a first-ever swordfish rod-and-reel catch.
“The fish has been processed for its meat and I have the head-and-tail,” says the angler. “I may make a skull mount of its head and bill. The tail width is huge, about 4 feet from tip-to-tip.”
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