Category Archives: Vikings/Pirates

Pirate Fleet?

At what point do we come to the conclusion that there is a rouge pirate fleet roaming the seas?  I’m going to say we’ve walked that plank when 3 ships are highjacked within 5 days.  

Two cargo ships have been hijacked in the Gulf of Aden between Yemen and Somalia, a Kenyan maritime official said Thursday.

“The ill-fated vessels under captivity are MV Lehmann and MV Arean,” said Andrew Mwangura of the Kenyan Seafarers Association.

The ships were taken Wednesday in roughly the same area where the Dutch-owned MV Amiya Scan was hijacked Sunday, he said. Mwangura did not know who owned the ships and had no more details on the hijackings.

The MV Lehmann and MV Arean hijackings would bring the number of attacks this year on ships near the Somali coast and elsewhere in the Gulf of Aden to 26, according to the International Maritime Bureau.

The bureau, which tracks piracy, said there had been 24 attacks as of Tuesday. Of those, seven were successful hijackings, the officials said.

A spokesman for the bureau said Thursday that no one was there to answer questions regarding the new hijackings.

Cyrus Mody of the bureau said earlier this week that Somali pirates seem to take ships “purely for financial gain.”

Financial gain my ass.  These pirates are clearing building a fleet of pirate vessels to get revenge against the  French Navy.  

Piracy Pays: $40K a year.

According to CNN’s top story a modern day pirate can make up to $40,000 per year.  I’m assuming this is a low-level pirate not a First Mate.    The article has some real gems such as these:

Why Piracy?

Since the days of Blackbeard, who sailed the seas in the early 18th century in a period known as the Golden Age of Piracy, countries with coastlines beefed up their navies and generally routed the robbers.

Yet analysts say two recent trends have led to a rise in piracy: access and opportunity.

As global commerce picks up, more and more of the world’s fuels, minerals and other crucial commodities travel by ship. Ninety-five percent of America’s foreign trade, for instance, moves by water, according to the U.S. Maritime Administration.

And this:

And although the motive is still money, today’s pirates are a far cry from the eye-patched, peg-legged swashbucklers of Hollywood.

Awesome.  But there’s hope right? Loannis Michaletos, security analyst for Greece-based Research Institute for European and American Studies doesn’t think so:

There’s a humanitarian crisis. There’s a food crisis, you have people who are desperate, and this is an easy way to supplement their income.

I am not optimistic for the future.

Either am I, Mr. Michaletos… either am I.

The French are not to be Trifled with.

After the French Luxury ship the Ponant was hijacked by Pirates the French did what you expect any sea-worthy nation to do. They attacked.

After the owner of the ship payed a ransom of $2 million dollars a team of French Commandos went into action:

Once the crew had been brought ashore safely, French attack helicopters tracked the pirates, believed to be fishermen, to the village of Jariban and moved in when they saw some of them attempting to flee the scene, the general said.

A sniper disabled the engine of the get-away car, while another helicopter dropped off three French commandos who captured six of the 12 pirates.

The pirates “gave themselves up without too much difficulty”, the general said, adding that those captured would be handed over to French justice officials.

“It was an intervention, not a pulverisation,” he added.

Now the French stance on Piracy is one I can get behind. The pirates are currently facing trial in France for their crimes. The British on the other hand have a different strategy:

The British government on the other hand, to the incredulity of many in the maritime industry, has taken a curiously pathetic approach to piracy. While the French were flying six of the captured pirates to Paris to face trial, the British Foreign Office issued a directive to the once vaunted Royal Navy not to detain any pirates, because doing so could violate their human rights. British warships patrolling the pirate-infested waters off Somalia were advised that captured pirates could claim asylum in Britain and that those who were returned to Somalia faced beheading for murder or a hand chopped off for theft under Islamic law.

I’m stumped. Isn’t this the same empire that would just as soon string your dead pirate ass up in Execution Dock?

How far they’ve fallen.