Captain Billy "Cap" Chaprales - The Harpooner

Bill Chaprales began fishing in the mid-1960's and harpooned his first bluefin tuna at the age of twelve. he moved to Cape Cod in 1969 and built his first boat, The Delphi, while living in his Chevy Nova.
Bill has experience in tuna, swordfish, codfish, haddock, lobster, crab, striped bass, bluefish, mackerel, and spiny dogfish. He is now the captain of the F/V Rueby and the F/V Ezyduzit.
Bill has extensive experience in the field of research working with the Mass. Division of Marine Fisheries and the New England Aquarium. He invented a tagging pole that is specifically designed to minimally harm the animal being tagged. He has tagged hundreds of tuna fish, basking sharks, and great white sharks. To date, Bill Chaprales has never missed his target when tagging a fish. He currently has a 100% success rate. To learn more about the programs and projects Bill has been a part of see our Resumes page.

Captain Nick "Niko" Chaprales - The Wheelman

Nick is the son of Bill Chaprales and has worked side by side with his father since he was in the fourth grade.
While still attending school, Nick spent his summers in Gloucester, MA and Portland, ME learning the craft of harpooning from his father. His winter vacations and weekends were spent baiting tub trawls and fishing for cod on George's bank.
Nick now works full time, year-round, with his father learning how to survive in an everchanging industry.
During tagging projects, Nick pilots the boat from the tower. The fact that Nick directs his Old Man over twenty foot long, man eating sharks is just another day at the office for this father/son team.

George Breen - The Pilot

George is a retired Delta airline pilot who has been fish spotting swordfish and tuna for decades. George was the one who initially found the great white sharks off of Monomoy Island in 2009.
While up in his super cub single engine airplane, George directs the Ezyduzit to the fish or sharks they are attempting to tag. George is a pivotal player in the success of great white tagging because of the lack of time the sharks spend on the surface. Most of the time George can see the shark from the plane while Bill and Nick cannot from the boat.
George has also done extensive work in the conservation of the ocean. In addition to working on the tagging projects he also flies to do surveys on right whales and many kinds of sea birds.