Guest Feature: Protecting Yourself Before, During and After a Pirate Attack (PART 2)
Written by Captain Richard Madden
Part 2
Sorting Out the Pirates From the Fishermen/Protecting Yourself During the Attack
First, you must have situational awareness. A few questions can help determine your situation.
Where am I? Being in coastal waters (i.e. within 15-20 miles of the coast) and seeing a skiff is far different than being 600 miles offshore and seeing a skiff.
What is the other vessel doing? Is it approaching me? Is it drifting? If the vessel is drifting, maybe a course change by your vessel will open the distance or failing that, prove that the boat wants to approach.
What can you see in, on or around the other vessel? Are they towing skiffs? Can you see fishing buoys in the water?
What do the small boats in this area normally do? This is a much more difficult question if you are new to the area, but one which senior officers should be able to answer.
In any situation, positive identification of intent is critical.
Second, you must have procedures in place for determining intent. Remember those procedures everyone drilled until they were thoroughly familiar? This is where they are implemented. As part of a layered anti-piracy defense strategy, a Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD) will provide captain and crew time and distance to distinguish between piracy threats and fishermen.
When a vessel’s crew spots a suspicious vessel and attempts to contact it by radio fail, initiating LRAD’s alert tone followed by a multi-language warning broadcast provide the first step in a scaled EOF. This critical first step in the EOF can be taken with LRAD at over 3000 meters (1.5 nautical miles) – significantly greater than the range of small arms or rocket propelled grenades (RPGs).
If the verbal warnings are ignored and the threatening vessel continues to close, the powerful LRAD deterrent tone can be used to delay the attack and allow the ship’s crew time to take shelter in the citadel while the armed security prepares their full suite of non-lethal and lethal responses.
Many times, when LRAD is used at a distance, the threatening vessel withdraws after concluding that their target is well prepared and potentially carrying armed security. By portraying a “hard target,” vessels can often discourage pirates, causing them to seek out a “soft target” elsewhere. If armed security guards are aboard, a scaled EOF must be conducted in accordance with RUF or the contact definitively identified as hostile prior to opening fire and using lethal force.
Every watch officer needs to be knowledgeable about the initial actions to take in a piracy situation.
LRAD – Proven at Sea
Since 2005, LRAD systems have proven to be an integral tool in a scaled EOF protocol, starting with the thwarted attack on the cruise ship Seabourn Spirit. The use of LRAD as a deterrent in the Horn of Africa region continued with its use by a Japanese Navy destroyer in preventing the hijacking of a Singaporean tanker in April 2009.
Aboard USNS Lewis and Clark in May 2009, verbal warnings followed by LRAD and evasive maneuvering proved successful when two skiffs approached with ill intent.
Capt. Steve Kelley, Commander, Task Force 53 commented on the foiled pirate attack, “The actions taken by Lewis and Clark were exactly what the U.S. Navy has been recommending to prevent piracy attacks – for both commercial and military vessels.”
After the well-publicized attempted hijacking of Maersk Alabama in April 2009, the vessel was equipped with LRAD systems. In November 2009, LRADs were used to successfully deter a pirate attack, along with other defensive measures. Maersk Alabama has had various opportunities to prove the LRAD system’s place in a scaled EOF protocol again, while successfully repelling multiple piracy attempts in 2010 and 2011.
“Due to Maersk Alabama following the maritime industry's best [anti-piracy] practices such as embarking security teams, the ship was able to prevent being successfully attacked by pirates," said Navy Vice Admiral William E. Gortney, Commander of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command and U.S. 5th Fleet. “This is a great example of how merchant mariners can take proactive action to prevent being attacked, and why we recommend that ships follow industry best practices if they're in high-risk areas.”
In late January 2011, the South Korean Navy used LRAD during its successful rescue of the Norwegian- owned, South Korean-operated chemical tanker Samho Jewelry. The South Korean Navy deployed LRAD to alert the hijacked crew of the rescue operation and to broadcast warnings to the pirates that had seized the ship. During the same month, the luxury cruise liner Spirit of Adventure deployed LRAD as part of her measures to thwart a pirate attack in the Indian Ocean.
Protecting Yourself After an Attack
There may well come a time when all the preparation and non-lethal defenses fail to deter a pirate attack and lethal force is employed. When that time comes, a vessel can expect a full investigation into the incident at their next port. This investigation might be by the ship’s flag state or by the nation in whose waters the incident occurred.
During this investigation, many questions will be asked about the chain of events and actions taken, particularly if lethal action was taken causing death or injury. It is at this point that LRAD will continue to prove its worth and potentially keep the captain and security guards out of prison and the shipping company from significant corporate and financial liability.
LRAD, being an audible deterrent, works in concert with the vessel’s existing voyage data recorder (VDR), which provides a time stamped record of all audio on the vessel’s bridge and bridge wings. This audio recording, along with the other information captured by the VDR such as the radar screen image, will show at what distance non-lethal action was initiated and demonstrate the scaled escalation of force that was implemented.
Preventing Piracy Through Preparation
The violence directed towards mariners held hostage is rapidly escalating, as is the average ransom for a pirated vessel. With piracy in the Indian Ocean and Horn of Africa continuing, and piracy increasing off the West coast of Africa, this threat to commercial mariners is not going away in the foreseeable future. Therefore, the proper outfitting of vessels and development of a scaled EOF/RUF protocol is essential.
Not only are these protocols essential for the protection of vessels from piracy, but also for the protection of mariners and shipping companies from both civil and criminal liability.
LRAD is an essential capability in both of these critical areas. It has proven its value operationally many times and, to date, no U.S. Navy ship or commercial maritime vessel equipped with LRAD systems has been involved in any accidental shooting incidents. LRAD systems continue to save lives on both sides of a confrontation.
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Captain Richard Madden is a maritime consultant and SUNY Maritime graduate with over 20 years of industry experience. He holds a USCG Unlimited Master’s license and has sailed on government vessels, offshore towing vessels, tankers, container ships, coastal towing and general cargo vessels. He has extensive first-hand, anti-piracy experience while operating in the Gulf of Aden/Horn of Africa area.