Tag Archives: piracy

Pirates at 21 year low (at least those that are reported)

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somalipirate

According to a new report from the International Chamber of Commerce’s International Maritime Bureau (IMB), piracy and armed robbery at sea has fallen to its lowest levels since 1995, despite a surge in kidnappings off West Africa:

IMB’s global piracy report shows 98 incidents in the first half of 2016, compared with 134 for the same period in 2015. When piracy was at its highest, in 2010 and 2003, IMB recorded 445 attacks a year.

In the first half of 2016, IMB recorded 72 vessels boarded, five hijackings, and a further 12 attempted attacks. Nine ships were fired upon. Sixty-four crew were taken hostage onboard, down from 250 in the same period last year.

“This drop in world piracy is encouraging news. Two main factors are recent improvements around Indonesia, and the continued deterrence of Somali pirates off East Africa,” said Pottengal Mukundan, Director of IMB, whose global Piracy Reporting Centre has supported the shipping industry, authorities and navies for 25 years.

“But ships need to stay vigilant, maintain security and report all attacks, as the threat of piracy remains, particularly off Somalia and in the Gulf of Guinea,” he said.

Intresting article on private floating armories in the maritime security industry

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SOFREP has a neat piece up on the scows used by force protection assets in pirate heavy areas that reads pretty easy. Its not all sunshine and cinnamon out there, from testicle-chewing rats and moody kit to Greek fire bombers disguised as cooks.

marsec

It was 2013 when I first set foot on one of the infamous floating armories on the Indian Ocean, and my experience on it was something to remember. It was around that time that maritime security companies started to rely more on floating armories to sidestep local laws and costs that land-based armories and hotels present. They started using these ships/armories to store weapons and as a place for guards to wait for the next transit.

In the Red Sea, the Gulf of Aden, and in Fujairah, the waters are filled with various kinds of ships—from former Coast Guard vessels to tow boats—all packed with semi-auto rifles, level-4 vests, night-vision optics, and a bunch of maritime security guards.

When piracy was at its most prominent, the fears of such a vessel being captured by pirates, thus giving them access to modern weaponry and materials, were not groundless.

Read more here

Private Navy Being Built to Take out Pirates

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http://www.informationdissemination.net/2012/05/insurance-company-funded-private-navy.html#disqus_thread

Many ships that sail in Pirate waters have been making do with scarecrows to ward off gunmen….maybe a couple hardlegs with battlerifles can do a little more.

Private Navy’s to fight pirates are coming, and we are starting to see more details.

A private navy costing US$70 million (Dh257m) is being set up to escort merchant ships through the pirate-infested Gulf of Aden.

It will comprise a fleet of 18 ships, based in Djibouti, and will offer to convoy merchant vessels along the Internationally Recognised Transit Corridor (IRTC).

This is the world’s most dangerous shipping lane, between the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea. The fleet will be operated by the Convoy Escort Programme (CEP), a British company launched by the international shipping insurers Jardine Lloyd Thompson (JLT) and the Lloyds of London underwriters Ascot.

Full funding will be in place by the end of next month, and the CEP hopes the fleet will be operational by December.

“The shipping industry needs to stand up and be counted,” said Angus Campbell, the CEP’s chief executive and a former director of Overseas Shipholding Group, the world’s second-biggest listed oil tanker company. “The time is now, not in four or five years’ time.”

Piracy in the region is costing the global economy an estimated US$7 billion a year. For the ship owners alone, every vessel sailing through the waters off Somalia is charged additional insurance premiums of between $50,000 and $80,000.

Ships opting to carry their own armed guards can be charged an additional $18,000 and $60,000 per voyage by security companies.

Although the European Union is spending more than €8m (Dh37.94m) a year to maintain a naval force in the waters – EU NavFor – its warships still cannot provide close support to all merchant vessels.

Russian Warships to Get NATO Communications Equipment

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BRUSSELS, April 25 (RIA Novosti)

Russian warships will be equipped with NATO navigation and communications systems to improve coordination in anti-piracy missions around the world, Chief of the Russian General Staff Nikolai Makarov said on Wednesday.

The issue has been discussed during a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council in Brussels.

“We decided to install standard NATO navigation and communications systems on our warships,” Makarov said.

NATO warships have been patrolling the pirate-infested waters off the Somali coast since 2008, as part of Operation Ocean Shield. NATO has recently extended its mission in the Gulf of Aden and adjacent areas until 2014.

Russia joined the international anti-piracy mission in the region in 2008. Russian warships have successfully escorted more than 130 commercial vessels from various countries since then.

Task forces from the Russian Navy, usually led by Udaloy class destroyers, operate in the area on a rotating basis.

A task force from Russia’s Northern Fleet, led by the Udaloy class destroyer Vice Admiral Kulakov, will arrive in the Gulf of Aden in the beginning of May to join the anti-piracy mission.

Udaloy class destroyers,
Type: Anti Submarine Warfare Destroyer
Displacement: 6,200 tons standard, 7,900 tons full load
Length: 163 m
Beam: 19.3 m
Draught: 6.2 m
Propulsion: 2 shaft COGAG, 4 gas turbines, 120,000 hp
Speed: 35 kt
Range: 10500 nm at 14 kt
Complement: 300
Sensors and
processing systems: Radar:MR-760MA Fregat-MA/Top Plate 3-D air search radar and MR-320M Topaz-V/Strut Pair air/surface search radar
Sonar: Horse Tail LF VDS sonar and Horse Jaw bow mounted LF sonar
Fire Control: 2 MR-360 Podkat/Cross Sword SA-N-9 SAM control, 2 3P37/Hot Flash SA-N-11 SAM control, Garpun-BAL SSM targeting
Electronic warfare
and decoys: Bell Squat jammer
Bell Shroud intercept
Bell Crown intercept
2 x PK-2 decoy RL
10 x PK-10 decoy RL in later ships
Armament: Missiles:
• 8 (2 x 4) SS-N-14 Silex anti submarine missiles (2x4 SS-N-22 Sunburn ASCM in Udaloy II),
• 64 (8 x 8 vertical launchers) SA-N-9 Gauntlet surface to air missiles
• 2 x Kortik SAM (SA-N-11)
Guns:
• 2 x 1 100mm/70cal DP guns( 2 x 1 AK-130 130mm guns on Udaloy II)
• 4 x 30mm AA guns (4 x6 AK-630 CIWS 30mm gattling guns in Udaloy II)
Torpedoes and thers:
• 2 x 4 553mm Torpedo tubes ( RPK-2 Viyuga/ SS-N-15)
• 2 xRBU-6000 anti submarine rocket launchers (2 x 10 RBU-Udav ASW RL in UdaloyII)
Aircraft carried: helicopter deck and hangar, 2 Ka-27 'Helix' series helicopters