Deadliest Catch: What Happened To The Cornelia Marie?

Did tragedy and scandal manage to sink the beloved Cornelia Marie? The Deadliest Catch fan favorite is no ghost ship but it seems that its days in the spotlight might be over for good. The Cornelia Marie has appeared in almost every season of Deadliest Catch. Though fans noted its absence from Season 19 of the Discovery reality series chronicling the dangerous crab fishing industry in the Bering Sea.

This happened once before in Season 13 with the boat returning the following season. Indicating the boat's popularity, a twitter user uploaded a picture of the boat near Valdez, Alaska, claiming, "So cool seeing a boat I've watched on tv for years wandering off into the harbor!" While the Cornelia Marie also appeared in the Deadliest Catch spin-off, Deadliest Catch: Bloodline, as of 2023, its whereabouts are unknown leaving

many wondering: What happened to it? "Crab fishing is not a sport for the weak. Nor the weak-minded." Starting in Season 2 of Deadliest Catch, the ship was captained by Phil Harris. But things took a tragic turn in Season 6, when Captain Harris suddenly passed away from an intracranial hemorrhage. The following year on the show, the Cornelia Marie came back skippered by new people, with the late

Harris' son Josh becoming the captain four years later. However, by the time Season 13 aired, the Cornelia Marie was, again, nowhere to be found. A 2016 Facebook post from Josh Harris explained his vessel's absence, claiming, "[Discovery has] creative control over pretty much everything that airs in Deadliest Catch, and we respect that. We are fishermen and we will be doing what we love to do this king

crab season, but we'll be doing it alone." Audiences were happily surprised when the Cornelia Marie was back for Season 14 this time co-captained by Josh and Casey McManus. It was reported by Country Living that after the sudden death of the original Cornelia Marie captain, Phil Harris, Josh and his brother Jake tried and failed to buy the boat. When the vessel appeared in Season 14, Josh, Jake

and Casey McManus shared ownership stakes. "Gonna kiss the boat when I see it." "I think the boat is going to be happy you're back too. Tired of me whooping on it." Harris offered insight into the vessel's one-year break when speaking with Yahoo! Entertainment, asserting that during the break, he had to contend with numerous family issues, such as the death of his grandfather Captain Grant Harris and

the substance use issues and assault faced by his brother, Jake Harris. Josh also claimed: "I had [multiple] people in ICU at the same time, and that put a kibosh on things I had to be home. Going to visit everybody in ICU isn't exactly a fun time or stuff that necessarily needs to be filmed." Josh would also mention that he hoped that Jake might return to crabbing

once his personal issues were dealt with. Saying, "Nobody wants to see this boat just disappear. They want to see the whole legacy keep going [...] we're definitely back, and we're ready to show the world what we can do at full force, a little bit smarter, and with a lot better boat." Currently there is little else publicly known about the status of the Cornelia Marie other than

its absence from Season 19 of Deadliest Catch. In 2022, MarineTraffic.com recorded the Cornelia Marie moored in Dutch Harbor, Alaska, while VesselFinder listed the vessel on the West Coast of North America around that same time. Though it'll be missing from its normal place of prominence in the nineteenth season of Deadliest Catch, a Reddit user reportedly spotted it in the background of one scene with its name on

the side of the hull blurred out. According to Distractify, they wrote: "Longtime fans will know [the Cornelia Marie] when they see her, blurred or not." Another user reportedly saw the boat in the season trailer, so it is very possible that the vessel may still be working in the area. But regardless if the ship is crabbing, on or off camera according to The U.S. Sun Captain Josh

Harris is also gone, embroiled in a sex abuse controversy from 1998. The Discovery Channel is similarly tight-lipped about Harris' departure, with a network representative claiming: "We've been made aware of this issue. Josh will not appear in future episodes of this series." If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or

contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).