'Whatever happened it must have been quick'

THREE weeks ago Martin Gardner was a proud father at the wedding of his 27-year-old son Craig.

Yesterday the Gardner family were united again in clinging to the tiny remaining hope that the trawler skipper and owner from Anstruther in Fife may have miraculously survived the sinking of the Meridian.

One family friend said: "It's hard to believe that Martin was enjoying the wedding just a short time ago and now we may never see him again, but things like this happen at sea. It goes with the trade and no matter how careful you are you can't always beat the weather."

The trawler was lost last Thursday during a storm 160 miles out in the North Sea. An air and sea search was called off last night.

As yet, only the body of one of the four crewmen on board, Eddie Gardner, has been found. Members of his family flew out to Norway yesterday, accompanied by police officers, to help identify his body.

Back in Anstruther, the friends and family of the three local men on the boat could only carry on as best they could and wait for news.

On the stone quayside, former fisherman Colin Murray stared out through a thick grey pall of drizzle and summed up what the town was feeling: "This is a very bleak day. This is still a fishing community and everyone is in shock.

"These were good hard-working lads I've known for most of my life. Whatever happened must have happened very quickly and I think it can only have been the severe weather."

On the surface, it was business as usual in a town which once boasted one of the biggest fishing fleets in the East Neuk of Fife.

Now just 10 prawn boats ply their trade from the historic port, their skippers electing for the safer inshore waters around the Firth of Forth. White fish boats such as the Meridian now operate out of Aberdeen.

The harbour remains dedicated, however, to the East Neuk fishing tradition.

A working lifeboat station dominates one quay opposite the Scottish Fisheries Museum. Both were busy with visitors yesterday as Japanese tourists queued outside the famous Anstruther Fish Bar for the nation's "favourite dish".

No one needed reminding that the crew of the Meridian - although last week on routine oil pipeline protection duties - have almost certainly paid the ultimate price for keeping supplies of fish going.

Few people yesterday wanted to talk about the crew, and certainly not in the past tense. In the waterfront Ship Tavern, the lunchtime atmosphere was subdued. "Like everyone else, all we could do was wait for news," said landlord David Shields. "But the longer the search went on, the less hopeful we became."

The Reverend Ian Cathcart, minister of Anstruther Parish Church, said the whole town remained in "limbo" more than 48 hours after the Meridian had disappeared. "People feel frightened to do or say anything because they want to hang on to their hope," said Cathcart.

"But really, this is an old fishing community, and people know what has happened.

"All I can say is that our prayers and support are with the families. If I went to their doors right now it would seem like there was no hope at all."

There were no suggestions yesterday that the Meridian was anything other than a well-maintained fishing vessel.

Last Thursday evening, it was patrolling an area 160 miles off Aberdeen in the Blane Field in the Norwegian sector. Its job was to prevent other ships from crossing a section of pipeline undergoing construction. Fishing skippers take such jobs to earn enough money to keep their businesses solvent when their EU-set catch quotas have run out.

One friend of Martin Gardner said: "He would normally have been out pair-trawling on another boat, but someone else took that job first. He took out the Meridian instead."

Out since October 10, the boat was due back in port early this week.

But a distress beacon signal from the Meridian - triggered by immersion in water - was picked up by staff at RAF rescue centre Kinloss just after 10pm last Thursday during a 70mph storm.

In Anstruther the same day, local residents were even then commenting on the severity of the weather.

Elizabeth Gamble, a volunteer at the Scottish Fisheries Museum, said: "The weather was terrible here, so goodness knows what it was like out in the North Sea. My daughter was walking on the cliff at Crail and nearly got blown off."