Captain Jason Chambers addressed Aesha Scott’s absence on the new season of Below Deck Down Under, and he teased drama with her replacement, Lara Rigby, and Chef Tzarina Mace-Ralph. The 52-year-old also revealed if he’s single.
Aesha worked with Captain Jason on the first two seasons of Down Under, but she was mysteriously missing from the season three trailer. However, the chief stew filmed for the latest season of Below Deck Mediterranean with Captain Sandy Yawn.
Speaking with E! News, Jason addressed Aesha’s choice not to return to Below Deck Down Under after filming on Below Deck Med.
“I would say Aesha had a story to tell, she had something to finish off,” said Jason. “Her and Sandy get on really well. They work well together. Crew leave and she had to go and do that, which is fine. She’s always welcome back.”
“She knows the industry, she knows the format,” Jason added. “She is definitely a huge help for me and we work so well together.”
The captain was asked if he’d kept in touch with Aesha since they stopped working together.
“No, I haven’t,” he said. “I haven’t heard from [Aesha] for a while. She’s been doing her own thing. I know she’s been really busy. I do track her. I know she’s had some great success being a little entrepreneur, which is fantastic. I know she’s getting engaged and married.”
“Our paths will cross soon. We’re in total different directions. We used to look forward to working together and we will connect again soon, I’m sure, especially hopefully before BravoCon. But looking forward to seeing her,” he continued.
Though he noted that Aesha’s replacement Lara is a “very experienced” chief stew with a “high standard,” Jason said her one flaw is that she “doesn’t know the format of the show.”
“[Lara] beats that with her charisma and her happiness and her vibrance, that’s what she brings,” said the captain. “Lara brings in a hell of a lot of experience, but look, when things aren’t going your way, we’re going to see some drama.”
Specifically, he addressed Lara’s drama with Chef Tzarina, which was teased in the trailer.
“I would say a little tense is the right word for it,” he said. “Her and Tzarina have to learn to work together.”
In an interview for The Daily Dish, Jason shared his relationship status.
“I’m still single,” he expressed. “I don’t think the time has ever been right. I needed to give a lot of time to my daughter over the last few years.”
Jason said he isn’t ready to mingle “yet.”
“The relationships I have had have been long, and they probably shouldn’t have lasted that long,” he went on. “I’m starting to realize why I’ve gone into those relationships. I’m probably trying to create something but not be 100 percent myself. So, I have put a pause on dating for quite some time because I haven’t had the time to bring someone else into my daughter’s [life].”
The star was asked when he thinks he might return to the dating pool.
“I think 2025 is time to get some stability, find out where I’m going to be based, get my career going, and then it’s right to bring someone else in,” he said. “So yeah, 2025 will be the year that I will get these other things done and then, hopefully, I can meet someone and I’m ready. I wasn’t ready before and I thought I was when I had a child, but then I realized I wasn’t… It was just all about my child. Now I had to put that on pause again, and now I’m getting all this ready to hopefully meet someone for 2025.”
