(Indian River. Del.) - Captain Ken Kiass and Paul Barbara caught a 62-pound Stripped Bass on Sunday morning near Over Falls. Kiass says "The rod went down and I knew it was something big because it was taking drag."
The two took twenty minutes to reel in the monster fish and were excited when they did. Ken adds, "We got it up to the boat and I was like oh my god it is humongous."
The Captain and his friend then took the fish to Hook'em and Cook'em Bait shop to weigh in and see if the fish could beat the Delaware state record.
Shop employee Chris Adams was there waiting and says "Put it on the scale and it weighed 60 pounds at first then we put it on our bigger scale and it weighed 62 even."
The shop then called the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control to make sure officials could confirm the weight. According to Adams, DNREC's confirmed weight is pending because the fisherman might have been past the 3 mile limit when catching the fish.
Adams isn't sure the weight will stand. He says "game warrants where telling me how they stopped them outside of three miles. So I would say no because being outside of 3 miles you aren't suppose to fish for them."
Kiass said "They check all my stuff out and said everything was fine at the time. So I don't see why anything would have changed."
Whether the record is held up or not, Ken will be telling the story for years. Ken says "to me it is a fish of a lifetime."
DNREC will be letting the fisherman know if their fish will be in the record books as soon as possible.