Hanjin Tianjin Hijacked off of Somalia

[Andrew McAlpine]

It is being reported that two vessels have recently been hijacked off of the Somalian coast.

Contact has been lost with the Hanjin Tianjin after is sent a distress call at 0500 Thursday Korean time (2015 Wednesday GMT), when it was about 400km (250 miles) east of the Yemeni island of Socotra, said Seoul-based Hanjin Shipping in a statement.

A South Korean destroyer, the Choi Young, which is part of international naval forces attempting to police shipping in the area, was dispatched, officials said.
on reaching the ship commandos stormed the vessel and were able to free the crew but found no pirates onboard, there was some damage to th ship but all crew were safe.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42696745/ns/world_news-asiapacific

The Italian cargo vessel Rosalia D'Amato is confirmed to have been seized, at present all crew of 21 including six Italians are belived to be OK.

http://www.shipspotting.com/gallery/photo.php?lid=773968

http://www.shipspotting.com/gallery/photo.php?lid=1273991

See news here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-13155479

http://www.seanews.com.tr/article/PIRACY/59915/Hanjin-Tianjin-Hijacked-Somali-Pirates/

Andrew McAlpine
Containership Admin

[Captain Ted]

good day all

the only solution to piracy is shooting them on sight. the moment they know they are dead when caught piracy will disappear to elevels where one can deal with.
I question myself sometimes, there are mighty Navies in that area who have plenty of vessel
at their dispose , they have satellite view for the whole area. But when it comes to pirates they claim they can,t find them. Or is it the case that they don,t want to find them. How my om said always,,getting a job is easy,, but keeping it is another story. After all this is about money and budgets, that more problems there,,that more money for the navies ?
brgds
capt ted

[Fred Vloo]

On this side of the world we stopped killing people without a decent trial a few hundred years ago. Deadpenalty here was abolished some 130 year ago. I'd like to keep it that way.

Have fun
Fred

[Kelvin Davies]

On this side of the world we stopped killing people without a decent trial a few hundred years ago. Deadpenalty here was abolished some 130 year ago. I'd like to keep it that way.

Have fun
Fred

Good answer Fred.
Haven't we been round this one a few times already?
BBC radio had a good programme on this subject last week and spoke to people on all sides of the problem.
There is a rag published over here under the disguise of a newspaper and they had the screaming headlines about a "Somali pirate given nicotine patches by the Royal Navy".
BBC spoke with the commander of the warship involved and the story was slightly different (of course!). It seems this person was such a cigarette addict that, after a day with no cigarettes, his heart became erratic and the ship's surgeon decided he would have to have nicotine patches to stabilise his heart.
The pirates were put off the ship a few miles off the Somali coast with just enough petrol to get them ashore (in the middle of nowhere!).
This was a decision from London. We don't want them here and there is no working justice system in Somalia and we certainly don't kill them just because we feel like it!
There is progress though in some of the surrounding countries such as Kenya and Seychelles who have agreed that pirates caught in their areas will go to prison in those countries.
A spokesman for Intertanko had a say but he was just asking for more protection. I wonder how much they are prepared to pay from their massive profits?
I also wonder what he would think about banning all ships from sailing independently and forcing them all to sail the Indian Ocean in convoys only?
Kelvin

[Captain Ted]

that may be as it is
but they don,t come to the ships with flowers in their hand,s and killing more and more sailors and also yacht people like the four no too long ago. That is seemingly then no problem. Where no law and oversight can be established or enforced then may be one has
to revert to technics which worked.
As for the death penalty, one can think on that differently too. Someone who kills peoples with no mercy and no wims has also no right to live by him/herself.
I for my part would not hesitate one second to shoot them on sight. Set them out on a coastline like mentioned above, the mistake was there that they were given that opportunity.
May be, perhaps the thinking would change if one has to sail/work in those areas and is daily through that in danger and not sitting in the TV chair and see things happen 1000,s
of km away.
 

[Kelvin Davies]

Ted,
What you seem to be saying is kill anyone that doesn't fit your idea of being a law abiding sailor.
Never mind whether or not you can prove them guilty of anything.
I have heard this view expressed before in the U.S. "Kill them all and let God sort out the guilty ones".
Never mind sitting in front of the TV thousand of kilometres away. I have never encountered a pirate but I did once spend a year fighting their mates, Yemeni terrorists.
That was a year of day in and day out, never knowing where the next attack or threat would come from.
Shooting the person that attacked you was reasonable but God help you if you shot the wrong person.
Even in those circumstances, justice had to come first.
Until shipping companies get their act together and agree on a convoy system in the area, it is difficult to sympathise with them.
As for the 4 that were killed recently, the US Navy may have to answer some questions there.
The pirates now have their trade down to a fine art, run along the lines of a major industry.
They even have an unofficial stock market where people can invest in one gang or the other.
They don't want dead sailors, they are worth nothing. It only pays them if they can keep the sailors alive for ransom.
Once they see sailors coming for them with the intention of killing them, they have nothing to lose. They know they are about to die so they may as well kill their victims before they go.

[Captain Ted]

Kelvin

Everybody is entitled to his/het own thinking and feeling about it.
seemingly you think that when pirates hijacking ships, whith rocket propelled guns and AK47,s we should applaud. You even don,t give the sailors the right to shoot back on sight.
Name me one reason why a group of men which boards a vessel at high seas with guns and willing to kill sailors in the way of doing so to hijack/steal/kidnap/murder) , has any right to be treated fairly in european courts or for that matter in any court in this world.
In other words you propose,,sailors,,lay back,, we navies and strong europeans coming to your rescue after we talked with the pirates for a few month ?

By the way, I am born and raised in Germany. It suprises me aigain and again when europeans bashing the americans,,but when there is an emergency again,,, Please,, America help.
You might want to go back into history and look back,,who bailed out the europeans again and again.  not the russians/chinese or any other nation

Blaming the shipping companies in this matter is also not a square deal. Everything is nowadays regulated through governments and in the shipping industry a lot via IMO.
Even if I would conjure with you on that,,that still leaves the sailors out of the deal.
There are 100,s of committee,s for all occasions,,the only one who is never represented by themself are the sailors. It starts already, if a ship carries guns, in order to be able to protect themselves,every country has different rules and regulations on that subject to the point like South Africa, if a Master does not declare weapons a/b 30 days in advance, he runs risk to be imprisoned on arrival.

I stand in that matter by what I said,,if someone with the guns first boards my ship, and I have the chance to shoot them,, I would do so with no hesitation whatsoever. The same way as I would be shot by them if they think it is needed.

brgds
ted