A marlin - similar in size to this black marlin - injured the brothers. Photo / File
A marlin - similar in size to this black marlin - injured the brothers. Photo / File
Two brothers have revealed how they were speared by a giant marlin while they were out fishing near Coffs Harbour last month.
Quinton Peck, 46, and his brother Nathan Peck, 48, were injured during the freak accident while they were out in their boat on the NSW's mid-north coast.
"Themarlin just jumped up straight in front of the boat," Quinton told Australia's The Sunday Project.
"It jumped, it never landed in the boat, it just jumped straight up and took me and Nathan out on the way."
Nathan Peck indicates where the marlin's bill pierced the back of his arm. Photo / The Project.
The fisherman said they didn't have their lines out and the freak accident occurred as their 5m rigid-hull inflatable boat was speeding at 40km/h in the Solitary Islands Marine Park on May 22.
"We're still processing it," Nathan Peck said.
"We were dazed, we got knocked to the floor of the boat, almost knocked out, even when you came round it was like 'what happened?' because it was like getting hit by a freight train. It was a heavy hit."
Quinton Peck, 46 (right) and his brother Nathan Peck, 48 were injured by a marlin during the freak accident. Photo / The Project.
Nathan said he barely had time to lift his arm to protect his face before the bill of the marlin went through the back of his tricep and out the back of his shoulder blade.
The marlin's bottom jaw then clipped Quinton's arm on the way through, ripping out his tendons and breaking the bone.
Quinton Peck's arm was broken during the incident. Photo / The Project
The fish was thought to have weighed up to 100kg.
When Nathan got up he saw his brother bleeding at the back of the boat.
"I could have sworn he wasn't going to make it out of that. I didn't know the extent of his injuries but I could see in his arm and he had blood coming out. There was blood splattered all over the floats and everything," he said.
Luckily for the brothers, their friend Andy was not injured and drove the boat about 20km to Wooli where a rescue helicopter was waiting to take Quinton to Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney.
Two brothers were seriously injured by a marlin in a bizarre boating incident off Wooli, north of Coffs Harbour. Photo / News Corp Australia
After Quinton left, his brother admits to heading to the pub for a couple of beers.
"We'd just had it, we absolutely had it, and we had to walk past the pub to get to the car and that was not going to happen," Nathan said.
"We were just sitting there going 'what happened?'."
Asked whether he thought it was ironic that two spear fisherman had got speared themselves:
"There's a huge amount of irony," Nathan said. "The hunters have been hunted."
