95th annual Blessing of the Fleet Biloxi
An incredible tradition continued in Biloxi this weekend as the city held its 95th annual Blessing of the Fleet, celebrating the start of shrimp season.
The event started with the Blessing of the Fleet wreath drop, honoring fishermen whose lives were lost at sea.
Following the symbolic drop, boats of all kinds lined up for a parade as they were blessed by the priest of St. Michael Catholic Church.
The festival was held at Harrah’s Great Lawn and featured music by Poplarville’s own Chapel Hart! The menu contained, of course, shrimp!
This was the first outing for the newly crowned 2024 Shrimp Queen Baylie Gollott-Ho and Shrimp King Van Pham.
They discuss what makes them proud representing the shrimping industry and seafood heritage. “It’s great and I’m honored to be a part of it. I think we need to keep highlighting our traditions because we used to be the seafood capital of the world and our seafood heritage got us to where we are today. I just want the best for Biloxi and our industry right now.”
“Everybody works together so we have to do meetings. We have to sit down, talk, and maybe get information from the kids, school kids, the colleges, and get more information so we can learn each other and make this bigger and grow.”
