Exclusive: ‘Deadliest Catch’ Captains Battle Their Biggest Waves Ever in New Season

The Deadliest Catch fleet is about to embark on their most dangerous season yet.

Captains Josh Harris and Jake Anderson of the hit Discovery show, which returns April 10 at 9 p.m. ET, told PopCulture.com exclusively prior to the premiere that fans of the show can expect a season like they’ve never seen before and will never see again, due in part to the unpredictable and violent weather caused by the supermoon event.

“Our tides haven’t been this strong in 150 years,” Anderson, captain of the Saga, told PopCulture. “So everybody in the fleet had something new to deal with that they never have dealt with before and probably will never see in their lifetime again.”

“Big waves,” he continued. “Lots of big waves.”

Harris, who is returning as the captain of the Cornelia Marie after a year away from the show caring for family, echoed his fellow fisherman’s ominous warning about the weather.

“Well, I picked one hell of a season to come back to,” he told PopCulture. “You know, we had this supermoon event, and it caused all of these massive tides, which in turn meant we had a lot of injuries and a lot of craziness.”

He continued, “It was hard to catch crab, and all this random stuff that happened this year. But as far as I know, everyone has all their toes and all their fingers on my boat. I’m pretty sure.”

The supermoon event, which on land drew amateur astrologists and photographers outside for a stunning natural phenomenon, had a much different impact on the Bering Sea.

“To basically explain it in layman’s terms,” Anderson explained to PopCulture, “if the wave heights were said to be 19 feet, where I was at, I’d be about 30, 35-foot swells.”

Not only was it hard to read the weather as a captain, bringing in the season’s crab quota ended up being a nightmare as the animals kept themselves hidden in the mud to avoid the vicious tides.

“Nobody goes out to a fast food chain when there’s a hurricane blowing, and that’s how it is for the crab,” Anderson added. “It made bad weather worse; it made crab fishing difficult; it made even fishing on the easiest of days very, very dangerous. And everybody will see that on this upcoming season.”

Deadliest Catch airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET on Discovery. And don’t forget to watch Deadliest Catch: The Bait at 8 p.m. ET prior to the show.

Photo credit: Discovery