Pirates Attack News

On Friday, August 13, EU NAVFOR ATALANTA Joint Operation Centre received an alert according to which the Turkish-flagged cargo vessel Anatolia (IMO 9005869) was under attack by a skiff with four or five armed persons on board.Reportedly, the skiff attempted to approach the vessel and opened fire with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades (RPG). One of these RPG caused damage in the vicinity of the bridge. After almost two hours of exchange of fire between the assailants and the privately contracted armed security personnel on board…

An offshore supply vessel was reportedly attacked offshore Mexico on Friday, July 24, in an incident that was described as a "violent armed boarding and robbery of personal belongings."The maritime safety intelligence company Dryad said Monday that the offshore supply vessel Natalie was boarded while conducting operations in the vicinity of the ODIN Offshore platform 12nm NE of Coatzacoalcos."It is understood that the vessel was boarded early morning within hours of darkness. A channel 16 broadcast received from the vessel stated “We would like to inform you that at this moment pirates are getting on board the ship NATALIE which is near the ODIN platform…

Pirates have abducted seven crew members from an anchor handling tug supply (AHTS) vessel offshore Equatorial Guinea, the vessel's owner Swire Pacific Offshore (SPO) said.The Singaporean-flagged Pacific Warden was attacked on November 20, 2019 at approximately 5 a.m. local time, while supporting offshore field operations in Equatorial Guinea, SPO confirmed on Sunday.Seven of the 15 crew members on board have been taken by the attackers and are presently missing, while the other eight are safely ashore and unharmed, according to SPO.Maritime intelligence group Dryad said local reports indicate that the 68.9-meter Pacific Warden was attacked by two speed boats while traveling from Luba, Boiko island to Serpentina/Zafiro field complex.

Pirates attacked an Italy-flagged offshore supply vessel in the southern Gulf of Mexico, injuring two crew members, the Mexican Navy said on Tuesday, in the latest outbreak of robbery and piracy to hit oil platforms and infrastructure in the area.One of the crew members of the vessel, Remas, received a bullet wound, and the other suffered a concussion, and both were transferred to a nearby hospital, the Navy said in a statement.Owned by Italian offshore contractor Micoperi, Remas…

Suspected Somali pirates attacked a Singaporean-flagged chemical tanker on Friday but were repelled by guards on board, the European Union's Naval force said, the first such incident in several months. EU Navfor said in a statement the 50,000 metric tonne MT Leopard Sun was sailing from Sohar in Oman to Cape Town, South Africa, when it was attacked by two skiffs 160 nautical miles (295 km) off the coast of Somalia. "The skiffs approached from the stern and fired upon her, after which the on-board Private Armed Security Team returned fire with warning shots," EU Navfor said.

Suspected pirates in a skiff attacked a Marshall Islands-flagged oil tanker, MT NAVIG8 Providence, in the Gulf of Oman on Thursday and were driven off by the ship's security, the European Naval Force said. "There was an exchange of small arms fire between the suspected pirates and the maritime security team on board the tanker," the maritime force, known as EU NAVFOR, said in a statement. (Reporting by Duncan Miriri)

Armed men killed eight fishermen in what appeared to be an attack by pirates in dangerous waters in the southern Philippines, a coast guard spokesman said on Tuesday. The apparent act of piracy came as Philippine soldiers were given a six-month deadline to end Islamist militant threats, including those made on cargo ships in south, where a long-festering insurgency has been exacerbated by the growing influence of the Islamic State militant group. About two dozen sailors and tourists were taken captive by Islamist militants last year in attacks on tug boats and yachts in the Celebes and Sulu seas, raising concerns among defence officials from Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines about Islamist militancy and piracy.

Pirates stormed a container ship off the coast of Guinea on Wednesday, making off with money and some of its cargo but leaving the crew unharmed, the government said. They fired guns and briefly held the crew hostage while they were looting the ship named Wendok, Guinea government spokesman Albert Camara said by telephone. He did not have details of the flag Wendok was flying under, the company running it, what its cargo was nor the nationalities of the crew. He said that Guinea's navy had been alerted but that the pirates had escaped before it could catch them.

Pirates have attacked the Liberian-flagged 4,360 TEU CMA CGM Turquoise, kidnapping two crew members off the coast of Nigeria, with the remainder of the crew said to be safe. Turquoise, managed by Dioryx Maritime Corp. in Greece, was stormed late on Monday as it travelled between Nigeria's commercial hub Lagos and Douala in Cameroon. According to Ghana-based antipiracy agency Maritime Trade Information Sharing Centre (MTISC-GOG), the ship  was boarded in waters about 30 nm off the coast of the Niger Delta. The captain activated the SSAS and the crew retreated to the citadel, but two were captured and kidnapped before they could enter.

Pirates attacked the fishing trawler Maju Jaya in Malacca Strait in Tamiang water in North Sumatra, Indonesia on July 26. Another fishing boat closed Maju Jaya from portside, two armed pirates went on board of Maju Jaya, threatening crew. The pirates were armed with guns and other weapons, locked the crew on the bridge and stole jewelry, mobile phones, technologies and etc. Crew unharmed. After that they abandoned the ship into a fast boat and headed to unknown direction. The crew got again the control of the fishing trawler after about 1-2 hours and headed to the island, where docked and reported to the accident. The local authorities started investigation and will look for the pirates. There are no injured people during the shore pirate attack.

When night falls over western Venezuela, armed gangs known as "pirates" sometimes ride boats into muggy Lake Maracaibo to steal equipment from oil wells. In the country's Paraguana peninsula, opposite the Caribbean island of Aruba, slum dwellers at times break through a perimeter wall into Venezuela's biggest refinery and rob machinery, construction tools, and cables to sell as scrap. On the other side of the OPEC country in Monagas state, around 26,000 potential barrels were lost in March during a shutdown after state oil company employees and contractors stole copper cables and caused a tank to overflow. Venezuela's national crime pandemic - the United Nations says the country has the world's second-highest murder rate after Honduras - is a growing headache for the oil industry…

The Baltic and International Maritime Council (BIMCO) informs it has continued its support for the Oceans Beyond Piracy (OBP) “The State of Maritime Piracy” report, which addresses how piracy is affecting the shipping industry – and beyond. BIMCO’s Chief Shipping Analyst, Peter Sand and Chief Maritime Security Officer, Giles Noakes provided OBP expert audit and shipping industry expertise to the report content. In addition Giles Noakes, will provide his expertise in global industry security practices during the panel of the launch event on June 10, 2015.

Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia are in discussions to extend joint patrols to deal with a resurgence of piracy in the South China Sea piracy hotspots, said Singapore's Chief of Navy Rear-Admiral Lai Chung Han. Singapore's Today reports that the extension of these patrols - which have been successful in curbing piracy in the Strait of Malacca - is complicated by competing territorial claims in these waters. The area and the Phillip Channel, which is 16 km south of Singapore, were places highlighted by Rear-Admiral Lai as new piracy hot spots. Lai admitted that there was concern with the proximity to the contested claims of South China Sea, and he certainly doesn’t want those issues to be conflated.

One coastal tanker is hijacked every two weeks on average in Southeast Asia making it the most dangerous seas, the latest piracy report from the International Maritime Bureau (IMB) has warned. The IMB says more than half of all sea pirate attacks since the beginning of 2015 have been in Southeast Asia. A report in the Voice of America quoted Pottengal Mukundan, director of the IMB saying that armed pirates attack small oil ships in the area about every two weeks. It was a disturbing trend because if firm action is not taken then we expect that the violence will increase and the pirates will get a little more audacious in the kind of targets that they will look for, he said.

Pirates attacked A Malaysian-registered oil tanker off the coast of West Kalimantan (Indonesia) and robbed its crew of valuables on Thursday night. Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) district operations director Commander Shahref Steve Mac Queen Abdullah said the tanker, MT Dongfang, was travelling from Port Dickson to Labuan when the incident happened around 8.30pm in Indonesian waters. "The ship's 17 member crews were not harmed during the incident," said Kuching district operations director Commander Steve MacQueen Abdullah. “The MMEA was informed by the International Maritime Bureau about the robbery, which occurred about 52 nautical miles north of Pulau Uwi in Indonesia. "The robbers, numbering about 25, were armed with pistols.

Armed pirates robbed a petroleum products tanker near Ivory Coast's port of Abidjan, a maritime agency and a private security advisor said on Wednesday, in an indication of the increasing mobility of Nigeria-based gangs. The raid on the tanker came just a day after two failed pirate attacks that occurred just hours apart in waters off Nigeria's southeastern coast, according to the same sources. Pirate attacks in West Africa's Gulf of Guinea, a significant source of oil, cocoa and metals for world markets, have almost doubled from last year, jacking up insurance costs for shipping companies. The vast majority of the region's maritime robberies and hijackings are believed to be carried out by criminal gangs based in Nigeria…

During the night of November 6, the EU NAVFOR warship SPS Infanta Cristina was attacked off the East coast of Somalia by a vessel identified as the MV IZUMI, a ship that had itself been pirated on 10 October. The EU NAVFOR warship had been escorting the MV Petra 1, which had been chartered by the African Union Military Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), at the time. This is the first ever attack on an EU warship conducting an AMISOM escort. During the incident, the Spanish warship increased speed and maneuvered immediately in order to place herself between MV Izumi and her escort.

According to a September 12 report from Reuters, pirates boarded a Japanese auto transport ship and robbed its crew off Indonesia late on September 10, but no one was injured and the undamaged ship resumed its voyage, Japanese media quoted the transport ministry as saying. Pirates boarded the ship named Cheerleader, operated by Japan's Nippon Yusen KK, tied up members of the crew, stole money and fled. (Source: Reuters)

According to a May 13 report from the Associated Press, a Somali “pirate middle-man” said he's made hundreds of thousands of dollars brokering deals to free ships and their cargos after pirates attack. The 32-year-old Somali, who would be identified only by his alias, Abdi Sheik, said he helped gain the release earlier this year of a supertanker carrying an estimated $150m of crude oil. He claims to have successfully negotiated the release of an arms-laden Ukrainian ship and the 20 sailors onboard. Details of his accounts of being a middle-man could not be entirely verified, but Sheik had previously provided AP with reliable inside information about hijacked ships and a business associate confirmed his involvement in ransom negotiations.

Early the morning of March 17, two small skiffs made a fast approach on the EU NAVFOR Dutch HNLMS Tromp with what appeared to be a pirate attack. The Tromp fired warning shots as they approached and it was this action that alerted the “would be” pirates to the fact that they were trying to attack a well armed Naval warship. The warship, HNLMS Tromp of the Royal Netherlands Navy, was patrolling the region as part of the ongoing EU counter-piracy mission, when it was approached at high speed by two small vessels, known as skiffs, shortly after 0630 GMT. Warning shots were fired by the naval vessel, which also deployed its helicopter to intercept the suspects who attempted to flee.

On the early morning of October 22nd 2009, 400 nautical miles east of Mombasa, Kenya, pirates attempted to hijack MV Jolly Rosso. Almost at the same time, MV Al Khaliq, a Panama flagged bulk carrier reported being under attack 180 nautical miles west of the Seychelles. MV Jolly Rosso, an Italian flagged Ro-Ro Cargo ship (200m and 31000 tons) was attacked by two small skiffs. The pirates opened fire with automatic fire and also fired 3 Rocket Propelled grenades at the ship. The ship took appropriate evasive action, managed to evade the attack and is proceeding on her voyage. There were no casualties. Belgium EU NAVFOR warship BNS Louise Marie was ordered immediately to close and neutralize the pirate attack position in cooperation with NATOs USS Donald Cook of CTF 508.

According to a BBC World News report, pirates used rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons to attack another US merchant ship off the coast of Somalia on April 15. The pirates damaged the Liberty Sun, which was carrying a cargo of food aid. The USS Bainbridge arrived some hours later, by which time the pirates had gone. (Source: BBC World News)

A major Japanese oil tanker was damaged Monday in a chase by heavily-armed pirates off the coasts of Somalia and Yemen but no one was injured, officials and crew members said. The area is plagued by insecurity and considered to be among the most dangerous waterways for shipping in the world. The 150,000-tonne tanker Takayama, with a crew of 23, sustained damage but was able to sail on its own power after the attack at about 4:40 am local time (0140 GMT), its owner and operator Nippon Yusen Kaisha (NYK Line) said here. The attack occurred in international waters some 440 kilometres (275 miles) east of the Yemeni , Japanese officials said.