Mandy Hansen Pederson is learning a tough lesson on the Bering Sea — and this time it’s not from dad Sig Hansen.
In Tuesday’s all-new episode of Deadliest Catch, the maritime academy graduate gets her first chance to captain the Northwestern unsupervised after working with her father for a number of seasons. It’s a challenge, but one the crew feels positive the Hansen daughter can conquer.
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“I’m alright with Mandy driving,” deckhand Matt tells the camera as Sig goes beneath deck. “She’s learning from the best. I mean if she was up there solely by herself, I might be a little worried.”
It’s clear Mandy does feel a little nervous taking the wheel solo, however, whispering, “Waiting on you,” while her dad is away.
At that moment, a freak accident happens that pushes Mandy past her experience level behind the wheel of the boat. When her husband, deckhand Clark Pederson, tosses the trailer bag over the rail, the line snags in the picking hook.
Despite hearing tapping on the rail from the deck boss trying to signal her in the wheelhouse, Mandy doesn’t take the boat out of gear, allowing tension on the line to build until it snaps, shooting the 3-foot steel hook towards the crew, who all dive for cover.
“What the f— does that mean!” Mandy says to herself in the few moments before chaos breaks out, trying to decipher the warning from down below.
“Wow that was intense,” one deckhand shouts after the hook lands on deck, fortunately hitting no one and nothing breakable. “Man, that hook almost killed me.”
Rushing up to deck Sig asks his daughter how that had happened, and where the communication broke down at a nearly deadly level.
“I don’t know what the signs are!” a clearly rattled Mandy tells him. “Him tapping, to me, it’s ‘Let’s hurry up. Let’s set another pot,’ and I knew there wasn’t a pot ready to set, so I don’t know what [tapping] means. And then that buzzer goes off.”
While Sig lays part of the blame on himself for not forcing Mandy to open the radio line before he stepped away, he reassures her, “I’m not pointing fingers, I’m trying to not let this happen ever again. That’s all I care about. The last thing I want is for someone to get hurt on your watch.”
As Mandy heads below deck to clear her head, the seasoned captain tells the camera, “There will be lots of close calls — that’s just how it is. I think that’s something she needs to realize moving forward, but it’s a lot to take in right out of the gate when it happens to you. It just makes you think of the seriousness of it all.”
Deadliest Catch airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET on Discovery.
Photo credit: Discovery
