Being a merchant seaman this hits close to home. Will Obama take action? Probable not, he more then likely wants to sit down and talk to the Pirates. Me I say blow them out of the water.

I am pretty sure Obama will have far more pressing issues on his plate at the moment. After all, he pays a number of other people to take care of these things.

But I agree with the second bit

I find it ironic that the hijacked ship, Maersk Alabama, had a cargo of food aid for Somalia.

I'm captain myself with Maersk Lines, so this brings it all very close to home, and my prayers are with my brave colleague who is still held hostage.

Last year the Maersk Regensburg was attacked in almost the same position as the Alabama, but they managed to outmaneuver the pirates, I had just left that vessel a few weeks earlier so I guess I was lucky, sailing in those waters is quite stressful, we do a lot of training and try to prepare ourselves and the vessel but we aren't military and those pirates have lots and lots of money to invest in weapons and fast boats.

Like the Regensburg, the Alabama is a slow moving, underpowered, vessel, those are the most vulnerable as the best escape is making speed. My present vessel, the Maersk Kalmar, is larger with lots and lots of engine power and she can easily make 29-30 kts, at that speed you outrun almost anything, at least until they start using guided missiles or something.

To me it's still incredible that with such a large navy force in the area, it's still not possible to hunt down each and every pirate, bomb their homes, and put a stop to this. Hopefully the situation will improve before I'm returning to sea in may.

Treeg,do have any perpective on why the ships are not convoyed in this area?

There ARE convoys in the Gulf of Aden, that's a smaller area that's easier to control. However some vessels were hijacked while they were sailing in convoy! Apparently those fast rigged inflatable speedboats the pirates are using are very hard to detect by navy vessels escorting merchants, so even a convoy does not guarantee safe passage!

The Maersk Alabama was attacked in the Indian Ocean, close to the border with Kenya, that's a very, very, big ocean-area and the pirates are operating hundreds of miles out on the ocean. There are just too many routes in that area, impossible to run convoys there (or at least you would need far more navy vessels then there are at present in the area). Armed guards on board the vessels would help, but the pirates are shooting with rocket propelled grenades, so you would need heavy firepower to counter them and those guys get so much money from each hijack that they can buy whatever weapons they like...

Captain free, 3 pirates dead, one in custody.

US Navy Seals did a great job.

I viewed a press conference today from the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. President of the academy, Richard G. Gurnon, stated at the press conference that over 200 merchant seamen from many countries around the world are still being held hostage in Somalia. I am wondering why we never hear of these hostages? That is a shocking number.

Not to take any thing away from the Military but you never hear about the sacrafices made by Merchant Seaman during war and peace time. Yes we do make a good salary but still away from home up to 6 or 8 months a year and the straits off of Singapore are just as dangerous as Somalia. And I can't think of too many places as dangerous to work. Even in Bangkok tied up to the pier or at anchor thiefs are coming onboard stealing what they can carry and at times robbing the crew.

WBU ALUM wrote:US Navy Seals did a great job.

I viewed a press conference today from the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. President of the academy, Richard G. Gurnon, stated at the press conference that over 200 merchant seamen from many countries around the world are still being held hostage in Somalia. I am wondering why we never hear of these hostages? That is a shocking number.

I think you will find in places other then the US - certainly in Oz - these things are reported extensively.

The hostages are generally the crews of the hijacked vessels which are awaiting ransom payouts.

I guess now that a US registered vessel has been involved, plus the actions of the Navy Seals, it will get a higher priority in the US news for a while.

merchant seaman wrote:Not to take any thing away from the Military but you never hear about the sacrafices made by Merchant Seaman during war and peace time. Yes we do make a good salary but still away from home up to 6 or 8 months a year and the straits off of Singapore are just as dangerous as Somalia. And I can't think of too many places as dangerous to work. Even in Bangkok tied up to the pier or at anchor thiefs are coming onboard stealing what they can carry and at times robbing the crew.

The obvious question - (in peacetime) with piracy, theft and away from home, why do you do it?

Congratulations to the US Navy with a very good job done!

jackspratt wrote:The obvious question - (in peacetime) with piracy, theft and away from home, why do you do it?

I still love this job, otherwise I wouldn't be doing it. Furthermore, I can live where ever I like in the world, my boss won't care as long as there is an airfield somewhere in the neighborhood to fly me to where ever the ship is, and I work 3 months at sea and then get 3 months payed leave at home, a perfect arrangement.

Many jobs have an element of danger, you prepare for that and then decide whether the risk is still worth doing it, I still think driving with my car on the Thai roads is many times more dangerous then 3 months at sea...

This sounds worrying for any hostiges currently still being held.
It's from an ABC online report:-

Referring to this morning's incident and the freeing of several French hostages in another raid which left two pirates dead, the statement said; "The French and Americans will regret starting this killing."

"We do not kill, but take only ransom. We shall do something to anyone we see as French or American from now," Hussein, a pirate, told Reuters by satellite phone.

"We cannot know how or whether our friends on the lifeboat died, but this will not stop us from hijacking," he added.

You're absolutely right Bandung_Dero, this is VERY worrying... Maybe we should just keep all our ships in port for fear these bad people will hurt someone. WHAT A LOAD OF CRAP!! Personally, I think the actions taken by the SEAL members has put the 'worrying' shoe on the other foot.

When they take hostages for ransom, they are threatening the hostages' lives so the statement that "we do not kill, but take only ransom" is just B/S. The whole scenario of taking hostages for ransom is, if you don't pay, we'll kill them. The only way to deal with these scumbags is exactly as the SEALs did - KILL 'EM.