Posted on 04/11/2009 4:44:03 PM PDT by BarnacleCenturion
Pirates Have Gas on Lifeboat, Fire Shots at U.S. Navy Sailors
The captain of a U.S.-flagged ship held hostage by armed pirates on a lifeboat in the Indian Ocean appears to be alive after a daring escape attempt -- but the pirates now seem to have fuel and to be moving closer to shore, sources told ABC News. The latest evidence that Capt. Richard Phillips, 53, is alive came as the pirates holding him in a 28-foot covered lifeboat fired shots at U.S. Navy sailors who approached their vessel at an undisclosed time after the escape bid.
(Excerpt) Read more at abcnews.go.com ...
” the pirates fired on a small United States Navy vessel “
Negotiations Break Down in Standoff With Pirates
Negotiations over the American captain taken hostage by Somali pirates broke down on Saturday, according to Somali officials, after American officials insisted that the pirates be arrested and a group of elders representing the pirates refused.
Somali officials said the American captain, Richard Phillips, and the four heavily armed pirates holding him hostage remained in a covered lifeboat floating in the Indian Ocean about 30 miles off Gara’ad, a notorious pirate den in northeastern Somalia.
The negotiations broke down hours after the pirates fired on a small United States Navy vessel that had tried to approach the lifeboat not long after sunrise Saturday in the Indian Ocean.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/12/world/africa/12somalia.html?_r=1
They’d possibly be able to use more than one mike to get some positioning of who is where.
~~~
Great point,,,
Makes me wonder just What our guys have down there,,,
X-Ray/IR/? to “see” through the hull...?...;0)
Ah yes, but it would then still be floating full of water. Which would make it a bit difficult to occupy without, say, scuba tanks.
Quite welcome,,,I learned things myself in that search,,,
“Dead Men Walkin’ “ comes to mind...;0)
Roger Dat!,,,
Praying here too...
I was talking with my very good friend who is a former SEAL ... team one. He said use re-breathers .... swim under the boat and sink it quitely. When the terrorists/pirates hit the water ... well ... no prisoners
I saw a news clip on the type of lige raft.
I thought one could possible drill into the bottom, but apparently not.
What a brave man the Capt. is.
I hope the pirates sink to the bottom of the sea and this wonderful amd comes home safe and sound.
The corrupt media has his back and will spin it for him.
For whatever reason, large parts of the MSM and Elites have decided our civilization is toast and not worth saving. Nothing else explains why they are active accomplices in accelerating its demise.
20 years ago such spin would have been laughed at. Now, I think too many Americans have been sufficiently dumbed down that they will lap it up.
Like a lot of fishing boats, Boston Whalers come to mind, the buoyancy isn't built into the bottom of the boat, it's built into the sides. I think if you removed the bottom, you'd be shocked how high in the water the vessel actually sat.
Check out a Freeper's post #73 on this thread. It's a funny story that gives great anecdotal evidence about how buoyant these things really are.
Oddly enough, the best thing the Navy and this skipper have going for them is time. The longer it goes, the more fatigued the pirates will become and the more likely the chance there is that they'll make a mistake.
From a guy who did this for twenty years, there aren't any good military options available on the open sea with a ship this small. As soon as things start to go down, the hostage would face a significant chance of injury or death.
MSM and Elites hate Conservatives more than they hate TERRORISTS! That's a proven fact!
Use a sub-—attach a line and pull the lifeboat under quickly and puncture a hole so water fills up. Have Navy Seals grab the captain and let the creeps fend for themselves. They won’t be shooting any guns when they are drowning in water.
That poses too much risk to the captain.
But it would make sense to simply attach a line.
That little life boat would look silly trying to tow a sub.
In fact, if the sub were to tow it further out to sea, I doubt the pirates would shoot the captain over that.
Yeah. The plan seems to have been to use the elders to buy time while their “colleagues” hot-footed it to shore. With the end of those negotiations, we’re going to have to find a way to slow their progress or the negotiation will be resolved in a fashion highly unfavorable to us.
All they do is embolden these terrorists to attack us again and again. I would not be surprised to see the chosen one pay the pirates ransom from his stimulus money as a way to end this.
That is the whole entire dang trouble. Caligula is personally involved ... to make sure the Captain ends up dead!
hey dude, I thought the Seals could swim like -50 miles underwater without air tanks or anything!
I want my taxpayer dollars worth on that Seal training stuff.
Why couldn’t they swim real quiet and sneaky like under the life boat and throw a flashbang into it?
By the usual misinformation from the drive-by media!
A lifeboat's fuel tank is ALWAYS topped up!!
Otherwise it would be useless in an emergency situation at sea, hello!!!
When this began there was a news interview with a man,a Greek name that I cannot remember, whose tanker was captured by Somali pirates in November. There were long ongoing negotiations about how much ransom would be paid and how the money would be dropped off. The haggling went on for over 60 days!
Here is an article about Somali piracy from 2005.There is a mention of holding one ship for 53 days and another for 101 days.
World
Piracy Hampers Somalia Relief Efforts
by Jason Beaubien
All Things Considered, December 13, 2005
The MV Torgelow returned to her home port in Mombasa, Kenya, last weekend after being held for 53 days by pirates off the coast of Somalia. The cargo ship, which was carrying relief supplies to Somalia, is one of 33 vessels that have reported being attacked by pirates off Somali since March.
The large cargo ship -- half a football field long -- was en route to Somalia to resupply one of its sister ships, the MV Semlow, which had just been released after being held for 101 days by pirates. The Semlow had been carrying relief supplies to Somalia for the U.N. World Food Program.
The relief agency says that with the ships sidelined it has been unable to get food into Somalia by sea for weeks. The WFP resorted to using a truck convoy, which had to pass through dozens of road blocks by various militias.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5052065
The small lifeboat and diminishing provisions might make the difference in our case, but all in all the Somalis seem to have an inordinate amount of patience.
He is building a 7-11 for them on shore with government funds so they have a business to money launder the ransom money with.
Its obviously difficult, and clearly dangerous if the swimming captain was only a few yards from the boat, but then again being held at gunpoint in the boat is pretty dangerous too.
Admittedly the WWII era gunners probably had a lot more training in the art, that's the essence of my point. I wouldn't be surprised that modern day training is way more oriented towards advanced, radar aimed weaponry, and it may well be that current day gunners have less training and practice than did their counterparts in the 1940s.
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