Countering Sea Pirates: Indian Patrol Plane "Thwarts" Pirates in Arabian Sea

Times of India report Navy plane thwarts piracy bid in Arabian Sea

A naval Poseidon-8I long-range patrol aircraft managed to thwart a piracy attack on the high seas by flying over a merchant vessel which was being targeted by "a pirate mother

ship and two skiffs" around 800 nautical miles from Mumbai last week.

The P-8I, based at the naval air station INS Rajali at Arakkonam in Tamil Nadu, was on a routine surveillance mission over the Arabian Sea when it received distress calls from the merchant vessel, the Malta-flagged MV Sezai Selah, on the international Channel 16 distress radio on April 15.

Indian Navy P-8I

"The pirate mother ship and the two high-speed skiffs had come quite close to the merchant vessel. The P-8I immediately responded and made warning transmissions over Channel 16 while flying over the pirate boats...they got frightened and altered course to leave MV Sezai Selah alone," said an official.

Nicely done.

Stopping Gulf of Guinea Pirates: U.S. Navy and Local Navies Put Training to Use

USNS Spearhead (U.S. Navy photo)

Nice AP article about a serendipitous situation in which 4 navies joined to thwart some Gulf of Guinea pirates in "Training exercise off W. Africa becomes real-life navy drama"

Capt. Heidi Agle, the commodore, had been directing a training exercise against piracy with maritime agencies of Ghana when the hijacking provided a real-life lesson, she said in a telephone interview Friday from her base in Italy.

First word came from the French Embassy, which sent information to Agle's USNS Spearhead via Ghanaian officials and U.S. diplomats of a possible pirate ship loitering off Abidjan, Ivory Coast.

There, pirates seized the Dubai-owned MT Maximus, on lease to a South Korean company and carrying 4,700 tons of diesel fuel, on Feb. 11.

The Spearhead tracked down the hijacked Maximus, identified it and then monitored its

Area involved

progress for two days as it sailed from Ivorian into Ghanaian waters. Then Agle handed over to Ghana's Navy, which continued to shadow the ship until it entered the waters of Togo, when that country's navy took over.

Eventually, after the hijacked ship neared the waters of Sao Tome and Principe the Nigerian navy successfully assaulted the captured ship and took the ship back. One pirate died during the recapture.

The rescue was directed by Nigerian Rear Admiral Henry Babalola, who told the AP that it was made possible by a maritime agreement allowing Nigeria to patrol Sao Tome's waters.

"When we challenged them (the pirates), they said that they were in international waters" with the law of the sea on their side. But the agreement allowed the Nigerians to storm the ship after eight hours of attempted negotiations.

"International cooperation is the new mantra for maritime security," Babalola said. "We cannot go it alone."

Six pirates were captured and 18 crew members freed. Several pirates escaped with two crew members who remain hostages, Steffen said.

More about Spearhead here