Wonder if the hijacking of the Greek MV Maran Centaurus is the beginning of a transition to choking off crude supplies, either on their own initiative or at the suggestion of their AQ associates.

“Millions for tribute, but not one cent for defense!”

Fifteen years ago they were stealing lines and brass fittings off the deck after moonset. Now they demand millions in ransom.

Absent the will to pay for security (and at the moment it is absent in most cases) next year it will be bloodier and more costly to live with. And every year there after until the tipping point (likely in blood) is reached. The price for squeamishness and denial will be very high.

“The only thing new is the history you haven’t read.”: Harry Truman

Well it seems that this is not actually the case. Lloyd’s List is reporting:
“SHIPOWNERS face some tough bargaining with insurers as the cost of buying ransom cover soars and some underwriters start to exclude this risk from standard policies.

The amounts being charged vary enormously from one owner to another, depending on the type of ship travelling in pirate-infested waters, the actual route or destination and the negotiating power of the vessel’s operator. To complicate matters further, some insurance markets include piracy risks in hull and machinery policies, while others such as London and Oslo regard piracy as a war risk.

As annual war risk policies expire, underwriters are beginning to separate kidnap and ransom and charge a far higher premium for bespoke cover for ships travelling in specified areas.” – Shipowners face battle with insurers over soaring piracy cover, by Janet Porter

Insurance did not help the owners of the ARCTIC SEA given that they went bankcrupt over the hijacking of their ship.

“So you never engage the pirates with more violence than that? You never use any type of weaponry to attack them physically?

No. If in the unlikely event that they might actually get on board, these ex-Marines and Special Forces are all trained in close quarters combat. They will all have their own personal knives on them and obviously it will probably end up in fatalities of the pirates if they did try to board the vessel. Because, while our crews don’t have firearms, they don’t necessarily need firearms to be able to look after themselves in self-defense mode.” -Nick Davis

Quit trying to push your snake oils on salty dawgs who know better.

We need guns to fight guns. Period.

An armed and professional security team makes the daily operations of a vessel passing through pirated waters safe and more proficient. When the crew does not have to live in fear, work is not affected, schedules are met and overall tension on the vessel is kept to the minimum.

I wish everyone travelling though rough waters a safe passage.

These people respect force, not perfidy not “diplomacy” not appeasement not negotiations not “here in my hand with signatures upon it”….bull…

So lets show them force!

I recall reading the interview with your security guards at http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2008/12/07/heroic-brit-trio-take-on-somali-pirates-before-escaping-into-sea-115875-20951441/ where your guy Mike Kelly was quoted as saying regarding the L-RAD:

“We thought it would make the pirates back off, but they just laughed. It was a total waste of time.”

With that quote I assumed they used the device, but you also make a great point about the L-RAD and fixed fire hoses… Fixed defenses don’t allow for much movement and become moot when attacks happen outside their fixed scope.

I agree with your security guard Carl “Rocky” Mason when he stated later in that article about what the pirates may have done with them due to nationality: “At best we’d have a beating and, because of our British passports, be high-value hostages. So we decided the only option was to go over the side.”

Clearly, we have to keep the pirates off our vessels, because the pirates will see the US crews as high valued targets, not just bargaining chips in the currently successful business model.

“”However, as we saw with the LRAD last November, on the Biscaglia there was an unarmed British security team of four who were using the LRAD as their final protective line. The pirates we shooting AKs at the vessel, and the security team had to literally jump overboard, and the pirates took the ship”"

The team was 3 and the LRAD was on the stern of the vessel and was not used at all in the attack as the pirates came from the port bow and boarded at the midships point on the starboard side.

The attack was all over in 11 minutes, however the team did not jump from the vessel till 40 minutes later when the helo was overhead – there was injuries to the pirates from the countermeasures and defenses my team placed onboard and did to prevent them boarding and they eventually had no option from the compass roof other than to preserve their own lives as the pirates were very very upset and were hunting for them onboard.

if you would like the full debrief then please email me.

Kind regards

Nick Davis