Arctic Corsair

Last surviving Hull deep-water trawler, preserved as a museum ship on the River Hull

The Arctic Corsair is moored on the River Hull beside the old Museums Quarter wharf and run as part of Hull's maritime cluster. The tour takes you through the fish room, the wheelhouse, the engine spaces, and the cramped crew accommodation, with retired trawlermen often guiding. It is the last surviving sidewinder distant-water trawler in Britain, and the conditions onboard say a great deal about the punishing work that built Hull's prosperity.

She has been undergoing extensive restoration as part of the Hull Maritime project, and access can be restricted while work continues. Even when closed to boarding, she is striking to see from the riverbank.

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A story
The Arctic Corsair was launched in 1960 and spent two decades hauling cod from Icelandic and Norwegian waters at the height of Hull's distant-water fishing trade. In 1973, during the second Cod War, she was rammed by an Icelandic gunboat and limped home with serious damage. By the 1980s her trade had collapsed and she was the last sidewinder trawler still working out of Hull. The city bought her in 1993 to keep one of these vessels intact.