Northeast Technology

Part of a culture is its artifacts, including tools, technology, and infrastructure. For commercial and recreational fishing, shoreside infrastructure includes docks, marinas, bait and tackle stores, boatyards, net makers, ice houses, chandleries (that supply ships’ stores, spare parts, and other items), and processing plants. Tools include gear (like hook and line, traps, pots, nets, and dredges) (see Nédélec and Prado 1990), fishing locating technology like LORAN (that uses ultrasonic pulses) (Holland et al. 1985), vessel monitoring systems (Lee et al. 2010), marine radio (Lees & Williamson 2013), and satellite phones. Fishing vessels come in many designs and sizes (usually measured by length or gross registered tonnage). In the Northeast,  commercial vessels tend to be under 100 feet in length and may be as small as 30 feet in length.