Pirate attacks - Page 4 - PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum

Botnst · #46 04-09-2009, 07:16 AM

Burn her!

dynalow · #47 04-09-2009, 09:14 AM

US Navy Set for Showdown With Pirates
April 09, 2009
Associated Press

NAIROBI, Kenya - A U.S. destroyer is keeping watch over the waters where Somali pirates has been holding the American captain of a hijacked cargo ship that was later retaken by the crew in an hours-long, high seas drama.

The pirates took Capt. Richard Phillips as a hostage as they escaped into a lifeboat Wednesday in the first such attack on American seamen in around 200 years.

Kevin Speers, a spokesman for the ship company Maersk, said the USS Bainbridge had arrived off the Horn of Africa near where the pirates were floating near the Maersk Alabama.

"It's on the scene at this point," Speers said of the Bainbridge, adding that the lifeboat holding the pirates and the captain is out of fuel.

"The boat is dead in the water," he told AP Radio. "It's floating near the Alabama. It's my understanding that it's floating freely."

The Bainbridge was among several U.S. ships that had been patrolling in the region when the 17,000-ton U.S.-flagged cargo ship and its 20 crew were captured Wednesday.

Phillips' family was gathered at his Vermont farmhouse, anxiously watching news reports and taking telephone calls from the U.S. State Department to learn if he would be freed.

"We are on pins and needles," said Gina Coggio, 29, half-sister of Phillips' wife, Andrea, as she stood on the porch of his one-story house Wednesday in a light snow. "I know the crew has been in touch with their own family members, and we're hoping we'll hear from Richard soon."

Phillips surrendered himself to the pirates to secure the safety of the crew, Coggio said.

"What I understand is that he offered himself as the hostage," she said. "That is what he would do. It's just who he is and his response as a captain."

With one warship nearby and more on the way, piracy expert Roger Middleton from London-based think tank Chatham House said the pirates were facing difficult choices.

"The pirates are in a very, very tight corner," Middleton said. "They've got only one guy, they've got nowhere to hide him, they've got no way to defend themselves effectively against the military who are on the way and they are hundreds of miles from Somalia."

The pirates would probably try to get to a mothership, he said, one of the larger vessels that tow the pirates' speedboats out to sea and resupply them as they lie in wait for prey. But they also would be aware that if they try to take Phillips to Somalia, they might be intercepted. And if they hand him over, they would almost certainly be arrested.

"If I was a pirate at this point, I think I'd resign and take up gardening," Middleton said.

Other analysts say the U.S. will be reluctant to use force as long as one of its citizens remains hostage. French commandos, for example, have mounted two military operations against pirates once the ransom had been paid and its citizens were safe.

The Maersk Alabama, en route to neighboring Kenya and loaded with relief aid, was attacked about 380 miles (610 kilometers) east of the Somali capital of Mogadishu. It was the sixth vessel seized in a week.

Many of the pirates have shifted their operations down the Somali coastline from the Gulf of Aden to escape naval warship patrols, which have had some success in preventing attacks in the Gulf of Aden.

The string of attacks follow a lull during a period of bad weather. The Maersk Alabama was the 66th attack on shipping this year so far this year, already an increase on the 111 attacks reported off the Horn of Africa last year.

International attention focused on Somali pirates last year after the audacious hijackings of an arms shipment and a Saudi oil supertanker. Currently warships from more than a dozen nations are patrolling off the Somali coast but analysts say the multimillion-dollar ransoms paid out by companies ensure piracy in war-ravaged, impoverished Somalia will not disappear.

The attacks often beg the question of why shipowners do not arm their crew to fend off attacks. Much of the problem lies with the cargo. The Saudi supertanker, for example, was loaded with 2 million barrels of oil. The vapor from that cargo was highly flammable; a spark from the firing of a gun could cause an explosion.

There is also the problem of keeping the pirates off the ships -- once they're on board, they will very likely fight back and people will die.

Pirates travel in open skiffs with outboard engines, working with larger ships that tow them far out to sea. They use satellite navigational and communications equipment, and have an intimate knowledge of local waters, clambering aboard commercial vessels with ladders and grappling hooks.

Any blip on an unwary ship's radar screens, alerting the crew to nearby vessels, is likely to be mistaken for fishing trawlers or any number of smaller, non-threatening ships that take to the seas every day.

It helps that the pirates' prey are usually massive, slow-moving ships. By the time anyone notices, pirates will have grappled their way onto the ship, brandishing AK-47s.

----

Most hijackings by Somali pirates have ended with the payment of a ransom, but not all hijackings have ended that way:

Ransom:

The pirates are thought to have received up to $80 million in ransom payments last year, but it is difficult to verify this figure because most companies do not say how much they have paid to secure the release of their ships. The most prominent cases of ships being released for ransom are:

- Saudi supertanker Sirius Star, which was hijacked in November and released in January. The pirates at the time reportedly received $3 million even though they initially had asked for $25 million. However, five of the Somali pirates drowned with their share of the ransom money after their small boat capsized during a storm.

- Ukrainian freighter MV Faina, which was hijacked in September and released in February. The pirates holding the ship said they received $3.2 million in ransom.

Rescue:

The French government has sent in their forces to free hostages:

- In September 2008, France dispatched elite commandos on a night operation to free two French hostages from their captured sailboat. The 30-some soldiers, wearing night-vision goggles, boarded the ship and in about 10 minutes killed one pirate, captured six others and pulled the French Polynesian couple to safety.

- The first such rescue by French troops was in April 2008. The helicopter-borne French troops swooped in on Somali pirates, capturing six of them, after the hijackers released dozens of hostages who had been held on a yacht.

Sinking of pirate vessel:

One of the most controversial cases so far is the Indian navy's sinking of a suspected pirate vessel in November. India said at the time it had come under attack from a pirate "mother ship," ordinarily a vessel pirates have captured to use to travel long distances that their speedboats cannot. The International Maritime Bureau and the Thai owner later reported that the vessel was a fishing trawler with civilian sailors on board. The trawler had been hijacked by pirates hours before it was sunk by the Indian navy.

Freed without ransom:

The most rare thing to happen is for pirates to release a vessel without being forced to do so or without receiving a ransom. In the past two years there is only one such case that has been recorded:

- In December, Somali pirates released a Yemeni cargo ship and its eight crew members without receiving any ransom. They had held the ship for weeks. Officials at the time said the pirates released the vessel after local clan elders and officials persuaded them to do so.

© Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

tankdriver · #48 04-09-2009, 09:22 AM

The Indians did the same as the French; sent commandos.

I don't understand why governments don't use the opportunity for combat experience for their navies. Sure, they have no stake in the boats caught, but why not a little practice?

LUVMBDiesels · #49 04-09-2009, 10:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tankdriver

The Indians did the same as the French; sent commandos.

I don't understand why governments don't use the opportunity for combat experience for their navies. Sure, they have no stake in the boats caught, but why not a little practice?

Exactly! This is especially true for the smaller vessels that would be used here. We don't need a carrier task force in the area, just a flotilla of corvettes or frigates maybe backed by a destroyer. I say declare all pirates and pirate ships as 'weapons free' zones and start sinking them. If we sink a few of their mother ships we can end this quickly...

Plus how does it look when the best Navies in the world the USN and the RN are taking a back seat to the French and Indian fleets?
I am not disrespecting the French or the Indians as they are showing that they at least have the b@lls to do something about this menace...

LUVMBDiesels · #50 04-09-2009, 10:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst

I'm picturing President Obama making that call.

The convoy idea -- maybe. As for the rest, we should reflag our ships as Yemeni or at the very least French or Indian as at least they have the b@lls to go after the pirates...

Medmech · #51 04-09-2009, 11:03 AM

1. Private shipping companies should be providing their own security.
2. Pirate bases should be attacked on land, they may also get some bonus terrorist figures.
2a. To handle water-born threats the Navy should arm a few freighters and use them as decoys to draw the pirates in and kill them.

Zeus · #52 04-09-2009, 11:48 AM

Merchant ships cannot bear arms and still dock in multinational ports.

That said, it's ridiculous that these vessels carrying millions in cargo are essentially floating banquets to pirates.

A coordinated navy from all the countries involved should be able to secure a corridor for passage?

I'm guessing therein lies the problem...coordinating navies from the US, France, UK, etc. Good luck.

jlomon · #53 04-09-2009, 11:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Howitzer

2a. To handle water-born threats the Navy should arm a few freighters and use them as decoys to draw the pirates in and kill them.

This is a great idea. Taking it a step further, there needs to be some way to take note of the mother ship that the small pirate boats launch from. Once the trap is sprung on the pirates in the skiff, then a Harpoon should be fired at the mother ship from BVR to sink it. That should only need to happen a few times before pirates start to think twice.

ILUVMILS · #54 04-09-2009, 12:23 PM

I realize this post will probably get lost in the thread, but for anyone interested, the book "Dangerous Waters" by John S. Burnett will answer most of the questions raised here.

dynalow · #55 04-09-2009, 12:23 PM

Somali pirates pick on the wrong ship
Maersk Alabama crew included graduate of US anti-piracy academy
Matthew Weaver
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 9 April 2009 16.00 BST

For once Somali pirates appear to have chosen the wrong boat to hijack. They have come to expect a lucrative bounty whenever they seize boats in the Indian ocean. But on board the Maersk Alabama was a US crew who were not only trained in anti-piracy tactics but who also took the unusual step of fighting back when their cargo ship was seized by gunmen yesterday morning.
Much attention has focused on the possible role of second officer Shane Murphy, who took control of the ship after the captain, Richard Phillips, was taken hostage on the Alabama's lifeboat. Murphy's father is Professor Joseph Murphy who teaches mariners how to repel pirates at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. His son is a graduate of the academy.

Shane Murphy was involved in overpowering the pirates and taking one of them captive for 12 hours. But it is unclear whether by fighting back, Murphy junior was following his father's advice. In an interview with Cape Cod Times, the older Murphy suggested resistance was futile after ships were taken.

"Once the pirates get on board there's nothing that can be done," he said. "We teach defensive tactics not offensive tactics."

Graduates of his academy are taught how to use guns to fend off pirates. But like the vast majority of cargo ships, the men on the Alabama were unarmed. And there have been no reports that they managed to wrestle a gun from the pirates when they overpowered them.

Cargo ships don't carry weapons because it is feared this would increase the likelihood of crew members getting killed or injured.

Anti-piracy tactics tend to focus on preventing pirates boarding in the first place. In the Alabama's case it fought off the pirates for up to five hours.

"We have ways to push back, but we do not carry arms," said the Maersk chief executive, John Reinhart. In the Alabama's case those ways are thought to involve using fire hoses against the pirates. They may also have made the ship difficult to board by speeding to create a large wash.

Tactics used by other cargo ships to try to repel pirates include the use of anti-climb paint, electrified wires and sonic cannons to fend off ships with a disabling noise.

Murphy senior would not divulge what tactics crews could use against pirates once boarded but he said his son would have had "a plan" for dealing with them. That plan seems to have involved playing for time and it worked.

First the crew sounded the alarm to the US navy and then disabled the boat's engine before the pirates got control of the ship.

Next, after seizing one pirate they hid on the boat for 12 hours. This bought them time while help was on its way in the form of the destroyer USS Bainbridge, which arrived this morning.

"We're just trying to hold them off for three more hours," second mate Ken Quinn told CNN. By this stage the pirates had fled to the Alabama's lifeboat with the captain as hostage.

Piracy expert Roger Middleton, from the thinktank Chatham House, said the pirates were facing difficult choices.

"The pirates are in a very, very tight corner. They've got only one guy, they've got nowhere to hide him, they've got no way to defend themselves effectively against the military who are on the way and they are hundreds of miles from Somalia," he said.

pj67coll · #56 04-09-2009, 02:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

Bringing a knife to a gunfight doesn't usually work well. I think the better idea is to bring a gun to a knife fight..

I did that once myself. Brought a gun to a knife fight. Works very well indeed.

- Peter.

aklim · #57 04-09-2009, 03:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pj67coll

I did that once myself. Brought a gun to a knife fight. Works very well indeed.

- Peter.

So what are you trying to say? That it worked well for you, IOW it didn't work for the other guy?

pj67coll · #58 04-09-2009, 03:06 PM

Something about that article seems a bit strange. The Maersk Alabama fought off the pirates for 5 hours before they managed to board? Surely during that time they could have radioed for help. Even if a Naval ship was hundred of miles away and would take hours to arrive it would have had a helicopter on board that should have been able to get there a lot sooner.

Anyway. Seems like the crew did a good job in this instance. But one thing I've been wondering. As there really is no war on anywhere on earth at present. Most of the worlds Navies have plenty of ships floating around doing nothing. Surely it's possible to saturate the area with a large enough naval presence? Surface ships carry helicopters that can greatly increase their reach and a carrier task force would have enough air power to swat any pirate boat that exists anywhere. Why the hell has almost nothing been done for so long?

- Peter.

pj67coll · #59 04-09-2009, 03:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim

So what are you trying to say? That it worked well for you, IOW it didn't work for the other guy?

Indeed. And I got to keep his knife

- Peter.

tankdriver · #60 04-09-2009, 05:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by LUVMBDiesels

Exactly! This is especially true for the smaller vessels that would be used here. We don't need a carrier task force in the area, just a flotilla of corvettes or frigates maybe backed by a destroyer. I say declare all pirates and pirate ships as 'weapons free' zones and start sinking them. If we sink a few of their mother ships we can end this quickly...

Plus how does it look when the best Navies in the world the USN and the RN are taking a back seat to the French and Indian fleets?
I am not disrespecting the French or the Indians as they are showing that they at least have the b@lls to do something about this menace...

As Howitzer said, private companies should provide their own security. The Indians and French only acted regarding their boats. I happen to think there's an experience benefit that has no relation to company security.