Midwater Fish Weight Angler Location Date Giant Needlefish (Aha, Houndfish) 16 lb 8 oz Carrie Asuncion South Point, Big Island 07/04/18 I couldn't have asked for a better 4th of July day spent at the ocean with my family. . That morning I set up my pole with a menpachi hang bait-style. Not even 10 minutes hanging, it got ripped off so I set it up again with a frisky ta'ape. Two minutes hanging and it took off on a good run, jumping out like a marlin! Running left and right at the surface, everyone had a show. Chucky managed to gaff it and bring it up the cliff. I caught two other ahas that day, using a Penn Carnage paired with a Penn 113HLW with 80-lb test line. I also cutbaited some akule and hooked up a nice omilu that gave me a good fight on my light bait pole with 12-lb test line! When we left the spot, we knew we had a potential aha record because the original record was caught in 2000 and weighed-in at 15.2-lbs. "We go weight it on the spring scale," Chucky told me. It weighed in at 16 lbs on our old rusty scale so we weren't sure. We rushed to S. Tokunaga's because we knew they would get a close weight. We ran in, asked one of the employees to weigh the fish and he brought the scale out. "Wow that's huge," the employee said, as we pulled the aha out of the cooler. We threw it on the scale and it turned out to be 16.8-lbs--a new state record! I filled out the record form and went home to clean the fish. It made an awesome dinner that we shared with family and friends! Tight lines! Aloha. . . . Carrie