LAHAINA — The Reel Hooker moved to the top of the blue marlin leader board with a 589.4-pounder with Captains Kihe and Joel Cota. They were on an afternoon four-hour charter, heading out to the 100-fathom ledge off Olowalu.

Other boats in the area were fishing a floater outside of Kahoolawe with several dozen mahi mahi around it. Kihe found the floater, but the mahi were being very finicky, probably from being stung by the other boats. They chummed and baited the school, trying everything they could to get a bite.

After working the floater for awhile with no bites, they decided to head back to the ledge. Another boat in the area had just hooked an estimated 350 but lost it.

They were just outside the LA finger when Joel saw the long rigger line bounce. He looked back and saw a splash, shouting, “We got something!”

Kihe turned around and looked at the long rigger. There was a big black shadow behind it.

The marlin was up on the lure. Its bill came out of the water and whacked the lure several times. It wanted it bad, but didn’t take it down off the rigger. Kihe shouted to Joel, “Tease it!” Joel cranked the line down a half-dozen cranks and then free-spooled it back up.

The marlin came back in hard, its head and shoulders out of the water with its mouth wide open, as it swallowed the lure. Once the rubber band snapped, Joel gave it a couple of seconds and then locked up the 80-class reel.

The marlin took off jumping as Joel started clearing the pattern. It ran out 200 yards, jumping and tail-walking like it was possessed. As it came up the port side, it put a big loop in the water for another 200 yards.

Kihe throttled the boat ahead and turned away, finally straightening out the line. From there, he was backing after the marlin for at least 20 minutes before it came up jumping one more time around 200 yards away.

They regained about 200 yards before it went down. The marlin was deep and swimming away, with Kihe keeping an angle on it. It was heading to the 100-fathom ledge and deep water. Kihe continued the attack, heading out after it.

The marlin seemed to slow its run and came up toward the surface. Kihe spotted it and called 350. Once they got up to it, it was straight up and down and swimming away.

Kihe stayed on it. The marlin made a turn back toward the boat. Kihe throttled the boat forward to keep the angle, getting really aggressive as they got it to the rubber band.

All of a sudden, they had it to double line. The marlin was still swimming away, but came up, made a jump, and took off straight out 30-40 yards. After the last jump and run, the fish seemed to tire. Kihe reversed up to it and back to double line. The marlin was straight up and down as it came to leader. Joel started taking wraps right after the swivel, walking it to the port side. The fish did not want to come any closer to the boat. Joel was trying to pull it up, fighting it for a couple of minutes, but it wouldn’t give in.

Joel was holding on with everything he had. The marlin had him pinned to the rail. The fish didn’t like the prop wash, digging in and turning from side to side, taking him back and forth across the stern 3-4 times.

The marlin liked the starboard side, because the hook was on that side of the bill and was double-wrapped by the leader in that direction. Every time it went to port, it always came back to starboard. Joel finally got it up, took a couple of wraps on the leader and held on.

When Kihe stuck the marlin with the fly-gaff, the pin holding the head snapped and fell out of the fish. Kihe grabbed the closest gaff, which happened to be a small mahi gaff, getting it into the gill plate. The marlin made a move and almost pulled him in. Joel followed it up with another mahi gaff to finally secure their catch.

Upon inspection of the bill, you could see where it had been hooked by the other boat, but the barb never dug in and ripped down the tip and came off.