ILWACO, Wash. — On Monday, a fire ripped through Ilwaco Landing, a seafood processing facility at the Port of Ilwaco. The building, the dock and thousands of crab pots went up in flames.
Although no one was injured, the community explained the fire would have devastating impacts to the community and to the industry, with the commercial crabbing season only days away.
Just days later, people up and down the coast are pitching in to help the crabbers and lift up Ilwaco with monetary donations, gear and labor.
"I think all of us right now are really feeling for these families because we are all in the place where we feel like one big catastrophe would just sink us," said Taunette Dixon, with Newport Fishermen's Wives. "A lot of us are small boat owners, and it can be a lucrative business, but it can also be very difficult. "
Dixon's nonprofit immediately began coordinating assistance, from donations to volunteer work, for the crabbers in Ilwaco.
"These people have been waiting for months, and they have been doing gear work for free and they’ve been fixing up the pots that they just lost," Dixon said. "It takes months to get them all together. They haven’t had any income coming in and this is a really a disaster for them."
Commercial fishermen in Astoria shared that same sentiment. Many are doing whatever they can to help, including Seth Whitsett. He told KGW almost a dozen of his contacts and friends in the industry have already donated hundreds of crab pots.
"I would like to shine a light on just the people in our community, on our side of the river, and across the river in Ilwaco, from Westport to Newport," Whitsett said. "The fisherman that have come together to help in light of this tragedy — this fire that happened a week before our season opener — I'm just blown away by people's generosity and selflessness."
Dustin Greene with the Ilwaco Tuna Club said their members have pitched in financially, raising more than $80,000 as of Wednesday night. He's also seen the hundreds of donations of replacement pots rolling up to the port.
"[The commercial fishermen] are basically in tears, a lot of them. Every truckload that comes in… It's pretty neat," he said. "It was definitely an uplifting thing for them after such a horrible thing, to see all of the outpouring of support."
Alongside their donations, Greene said some of the sport fishing club members will get a crash course this week, to lend a hand.
"Some of the members are coming into town tomorrow, that know some of the commercial guys, they are going to crab pot rigging school tomorrow basically," Greene said. "They are going to learn how to do it."