PIRACY - 400nm out into North Atlantic!

lenseman said:
Just in:

EASTERN NORTH ATLANTIC.

PIRACY.
45 FOOT VESSEL PRIDE OF AFRICA, WHITE HULL, THREE PERSONS ON BOARD, REPORTS POSSIBLE PIRACY ACTIVITY VICINITY 07° 06'N 021° 21'W AT 302227Z APR.

REPORTS TO MRCC RABAT, PHONE: 2125 3762 5877, 2125 3762 5897,

E-MAIL: MRCC.RABAT@MPM.GOV.MA.

CAUTION ADVISED.


(011107Z MAY 2012)

NNNN
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http://www.marinetraffic.com/ais/shipdetails.aspx?mmsi=601140200

Wonder what "possible pirate activity" means. Could be anything from a full on chase to a fishing boat having a look.
 
Conachair said:
http://www.marinetraffic.com/ais/shipdetails.aspx?mmsi=601140200

Wonder what "possible pirate activity" means. Could be anything from a full on chase to a fishing boat having a look.
Click to expand...

Probably some local fishermen wanting a few cigarettes in exchange for fish and the crew of the Pride of Africa hit the O.S. Button and sent out a distress message? :confused:

It does seem to be a very long way out into the Atlantic as piracy in this area is usually concentrated around the Gulf of Guinea area and the SâoTomé Islands?
 
Maybe not pirates. I remember reading a horror story of two open boats full of would-be illegal immigrants setting out from West Africa for the Canary Islands but with the great distance and no navigational instruments they missed them.

Totally lost far out in the Atlantic, low on food and water, they pursued a yacht, which could not outrun them, and in their desperation wanted to board. The skipper knew this would be catastrophic but could hold them off by an HF link to the Canary Island coast guard, who said they would come. Telling them this - he luckily had a French-speaking crew member - plus handing over all the food and water he could spare, he could convince them to stay on their own boats. What he didn't tell them was that with the distance it would take the Spanish Coast Guard two days to get there.

Perhaps this was a similar boat that had missed the Cape Verde group.
 
Barnac1e said:
Maybe not pirates. I remember reading a horror story of two open boats full of would-be illegal immigrants setting out from West Africa for the Canary Islands but with the great distance and no navigational instruments they missed them.

Totally lost far out in the Atlantic, low on food and water, they pursued a yacht, which could not outrun them, and in their desperation wanted to board. The skipper knew this would be catastrophic but could hold them off by an HF link to the Canary Island coast guard, who said they would come. Telling them this - he luckily had a French-speaking crew member - plus handing over all the food and water he could spare, he could convince them to stay on their own boats. What he didn't tell them was that with the distance it would take the Spanish Coast Guard two days to get there.

Perhaps this was a similar boat that had missed the Cape Verde group.
Click to expand...

No way of knowing from the scant info here but stuff like that does happen. Fishing boats not answering radios and crews too naive to figure out that they won´t have radios with a bit of paranoia thrown in turns into an "incident".

But in this case - who knows.
 
not wishing to to be alarmist but with the demise in Western European Navies generally and a complete lack of Long Range Maritime Patrol aircraft piracy generally is bound to increase.

When i was in the RAF as a Nimrod Captain(not that long ago) we had 30 aircraft patrolling the seas around the UK and it was very effective in knowing what was going on. Now we have none and the bad guys have complete freedom, operating very largely completly undetected. THe same apllies to "open ocean" Search and Rescue.
 
Barnac1e said:
Maybe not pirates. I remember reading a horror story of two open boats full of would-be illegal immigrants setting out from West Africa for the Canary Islands but with the great distance and no navigational instruments they missed them.

Totally lost far out in the Atlantic, low on food and water, they pursued a yacht, which could not outrun them, and in their desperation wanted to board. The skipper knew this would be catastrophic but could hold them off by an HF link to the Canary Island coast guard, who said they would come. Telling them this - he luckily had a French-speaking crew member - plus handing over all the food and water he could spare, he could convince them to stay on their own boats. What he didn't tell them was that with the distance it would take the Spanish Coast Guard two days to get there.
Click to expand...
Back in February 2008 there was an excellent series of postings here by Caribbeancat, the skipper of 'Tallulah', about a recent encounter they had had, together with a yacht 'If Only', with such an immigrant vessel, a launch of 7-9m with an estimated 50 (!) people aboard. 'If Only' was boarded and looked likely to be hijacked, but the situation was resolved by a rescue boat from the Canaries arriving after a couple of days, after various other ships and yachts had attempted to intervene.

If Caribbeancat is still around, it would be interesting to hear his take. He did post some useful "lessons learned" at the time which I could repost, but they are lengthy and sorry, I can't trace his original posting.
 
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AndrewB said:
Back in February 2008 there was an excellent series of postings here by Caribbeancat, the skipper of 'Tallulah', about a recent encounter they had had, together with a yacht 'If Only', with such an immigrant vessel, a launch of 7-9m with an estimated 50 (!) people aboard. 'If Only' was boarded and looked likely to be hijacked, but the situation was resolved by a rescue boat from the Canaries arriving after a couple of days, after various other ships and yachts had attempted to intervene.

If Caribbeancat is still around, it would be interesting to hear his take. He did post some useful "lessons learned" at the time which I could repost, but they are lengthy and sorry, I can't trace his original posting.
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Indeed it would, and I'm wondering if we are not referring to the same incident - I may well have not got all details correct.

I just know that the case made a deep impression on me - the plight of the poor survivors whom one may want to help but also to know that so many could never be accommodated. So far from land and beyond normal VHF range it was providential that the yacht had other comms facilities. I think that is the "lesson learned" for me if I should ever venture so far again (unlikely). A satellite phone would look very attractive in such a case.

Such a scenario could soon develop into an ugly one with a horde of desperate and terrified people who see commandeering your boat as their only chance of survival. And it needn't necessarily be the Atlantic - great numbers are pouring out of North Africa, the Mediterranean is not immune and I see things getting worse, rather than better.
 
lenseman said:
Just in:

EASTERN NORTH ATLANTIC.

PIRACY.
45 FOOT VESSEL PRIDE OF AFRICA, WHITE HULL, THREE PERSONS ON BOARD, REPORTS POSSIBLE PIRACY ACTIVITY VICINITY 07° 06'N 021° 21'W AT 302227Z APR.

REPORTS TO MRCC RABAT, PHONE: 2125 3762 5877, 2125 3762 5897,

E-MAIL: MRCC.RABAT@MPM.GOV.MA.

CAUTION ADVISED.

(011107Z MAY 2012)

NNNN
Click to expand...

UPDATE: 02 MAY 2012

EASTERN NORTH ATLANTIC. PIRACY. CANCEL AND THIS MSG.

(011341Z MAY 2012)

Looks like it was cancelled about 2½ hours after the first shout, possibly hit a pre-programmed text message saying "Under attack by pirates"?

All's well. :)
 
Andy and Lyn said:
not wishing to to be alarmist but with the demise in Western European Navies generally and a complete lack of Long Range Maritime Patrol aircraft piracy generally is bound to increase.

When i was in the RAF as a Nimrod Captain(not that long ago) we had 30 aircraft patrolling the seas around the UK and it was very effective in knowing what was going on. Now we have none and the bad guys have complete freedom, operating very largely completly undetected. THe same apllies to "open ocean" Search and Rescue.
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How long ago was THAT??? Are you actually saying we had 30 Nims constantly in the air around the UK? I didn't know we ever had many more than that in total... I think you would have been lucky to find 2 on Tapestry patrolling the seas around the UK at any one time. Maybe one out of Kinloss and another out of St Mawgan in the good old days... and possibly one on call for additional SAR cover.
 
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Andy and Lyn said:
not wishing to to be alarmist but with the demise in Western European Navies generally and a complete lack of Long Range Maritime Patrol aircraft piracy generally is bound to increase.
Click to expand...
Tosh.

By far the overwhelming factor here is the world population increasing from 2.5 billion in 1945 to 7 billion today. These are economic driven pirates and migrants, at its peak NATO was not capable of dealing with this threat.

In 1948, with hundreds of ships, the Royal Navy could not cope with the Jewish exodus to Palestine.
 
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