I just listened to a passenger's story of what happened. Man that sure sounded scary. Cruise liner outruns armed pirate boats By CNNRadio's Matt Cherry and Amanda Moyer (CNN) -- A luxury cruise line will re-evaluate whether to offer future cruises off the coast of Somalia after pirates attempted to attack one of its ships early Saturday. The pirates were in two small boats and were carrying machine guns and a rocket-propelled grenade when they attempted the attack on Seabourn Cruise Lines' "Spirit" about 5:35 a.m. local time Saturday, Deborah Natansohn, president of the cruise line, told CNNRadio. The ship was carrying 150 passengers and a crew of about 160. The ship, she said, immediately instituted its emergency response system. "The occupants of those boats did not succeed in boarding the ship and eventually turned away ... our captain and crew did a terrific job taking responsive action." Passenger Mike Rogers of Vancouver, Canada, said the pirates were shooting and sending rockets at the boat. (Watch how cruise ship outran pirates -- 1:28) "The captain tried to run one of the boats over, but they were small boats, about 25 feet long," he told CNNRadio affiliate CKNW in Vancouver. "Each one had four or five people on it, and (the captain) said he was going to do anything to keep them from getting on board." The captain, however, did not hit the alarm button to alert passengers of the emergency, Rogers said. "He announced it over the speakers because he was scared people would run up on deck, and he didn't want people on deck because they would have been shot." The cruise ship eventually outran the pirates' boats, Natansohn said. One person suffered minor injuries, she said without elaborating. "There's some minor damage done to the ship," Rogers said. "There's no water right now, for instance, in some places, and I believe one of the grenades actually went off in one of the cabins, but everyone on board is fine." The ship is now en route to the Seychelles Islands, Natansohn said. On Thursday, the United Nations' World Food Program warned that hijackings off the coast of Somalia were restricting the delivery of needed food assistance to the country. "The southern Somali coastline is one of the most dangerous in the world," the WFP said on its Web site. "In recent months, WFP's operations in Somalia have been sabotaged by the hijackings of two vessels carrying relief food. Ship owners are now demanding armed escorts to travel in these waters." Natansohn said efforts were under way Saturday to locate the pirates. "We have notified U.S., Canadian and Australian authorities because most of our passengers come from those three countries, as well as local authorities in Africa." "Seabourn 'Spirit' has offered itineraries in that part of the world before, but we'll obviously be looking at the incident to determine what to do in the future," she said. Rogers said, "We're always looking for adventure, but this is probably a little more than we would normally look for." http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/africa/11/05/somalia.pirates/index.html
Hell yeah and it is really bad is some parts of the world. I believe three U.N. food ships were captured by pirates when dropping off aid for Ethiopia, Somalia and other African nations. After the major tsunami that hit last year one of the main threats to aid ships were pirates. Now these pirates are the one-eye patch wearing, sword swinging, argghh matey ones with large sailing boats that we have come to know but are ones as described in the article, in possession of automatic weapons, speed boats etc. Wild stuff...
For more info on modern day pirates and their activities, visit your local video rental store and get a copy of Captain Ron. You'll be glad you did.
It's too bad the pirates couldn't take over the ship. It would have made for a good real-life TV movie on NBC. We should send Arnold Schwarzenneger in a boat with all the weapons he needs so he can lay it on them when they try to attack him. Seriously, though, that's messed up that pirates still exist even today. What a freaking joke! Someone should open up a can of whoop-ass on them. Also, how does a cruise ship outrun these boats? Are these pirate boats powered by 20 hp motors or something. LOL. Maybe these pirates need some ski boats? I think the pirates realized it was all in vain and stopped pursuit versus being "outrun". Or, maybe they did get outrun due to their inferior pirate ships. Arghhhhhh!
A luxury cruise line will re-evaluate whether to offer future cruises off the coast of Somalia.... I stopped right there. HELLO? Its actually a fairly big problem in the south pacific. Almost non-existent in the Caribbean so it doesn't make US news too often.
It says in the article, and in the video that they went straight out to see. (away from the coast). This is because the knew that because of the size the smaller pirate boats won't be able to keep up with them with the big waves etc. They aren't sea worthy compared to the cruise. Plus, those ships aren't all that slow.
