M/K HELAND

The Norwegian motor cutters were built in response to impulses from England. The fishing vessel M/K Heland, which you now can visit at Sunnmøre Museum, is an example of this type of boat that has influenced fishing for a large part of the 20th century.

Heland is approximately 60 foot and was from the start equipped with an 85 horsepower Håhjem engine.

The 1920s and 30s were difficult times with low fish prices and little or no earning potential. Heland was built in 1937 at a time where the new buildings of boats for seafaring fishermen had begun on a modest scale.

The boat had three functions. They fished using the boat all year round. During the wintertime, Heland went driftnet fishing for large winter herring.

After the herring came cod fishing and then came putting on the canon and the shark and small whale harvesting began in May and June. The whale harvesting was done in the North Sea and the Barents Sea by Jan Mayen and in the waters around Iceland.
They subsequently fished halibut with long-line at Storegga in September - October.

The vessel was also used for tunny fishing and Greenland shark fishing.

The use of the boat followed a pattern that was common for most fishing boats from the 1930s up until the 1960s. The cutters were numerous in the Sunnmøre fishing fleet up until 1960. They provided a livelihood for many and were an important part of daily and working life.

M/K Heland and the war

M/K Heland was one of the last vessels to join the shipping traffic to England. The Germans preferred to utilize the solid vessel to transport equipment for the reconstruction of a stronghold installation at Vigra. As a rule, the skipper Severin Roald was notified in advance – thus enabling him to waylay the passage.

In the autumn of 1941, he received an inquiry from a local resistance group as to whether he could take part in transporting agents and weapons between Shetland and Sunnmøre. Roald’s reply was yes.

After having made two trips across the North Sea for the intelligence organization SOE and for Milorg at year-end 1941, the vessel made a new trip: this time with 23 refugees on board. Heland set out from Vigra 25 February 1942 and reached Lerwick in Shetland two days later.

Heland became one of the fishing vessel in the fleet of the Shetland Bus, and carried out further trips to Norway.