Risk Management: Combating Piracy

As morning broke over the Gulf of Aden June 1, a white skiff sped toward a commercial ship en route off the East African Coast. Five Somali pirates were bearing down on their latest target, a tanker that if captured could bring them millions of dollars in ransom.

* Lesson No. 1: Be Prepared
* Paying for Piracy
* Piracy: By the Numbers
* 10 Steps to Respond to Piracy
* Washington Responds to Piracy
* Q&A: Liability of Carrier for Piracy
* Online Counter-Piracy Resources
* Interview with Avalon Security (Advertorial)

The tanker’s officers increased the ship’s speed, activating high pressure fire hoses and mustering the crew while taking evasive maneuvers and alerting nearby naval forces. The pirates closed to within about 30 feet, firing automatic weapons at the ship.

This encounter ended fortunately for the tanker and its crew. “The robust anti-piracy measures resulted in the pirates aborting the attempt,” the International Maritime Bureau said in its online Live Piracy Report. A warship later arrived at the scene.

The attack — the 206th in the region this year — was one more foray in what’s become a cat-and-mouse game pitting pirates operating from fishing boats against the world’s largest commercial vessels and a multinational naval coalition.

Off the coast of Somalia, piracy is a growth business. Somali pirates have been hijacking vessels since the mid-1990s, but they raised the stakes last year, attacking 111 vessels, a 152 percent increase over 2007, and hijacking 42 ships.

The Somali pirates hold more than vessels and mariners hostage — they imperil supply chains and raise transportation costs as shipowners add defensive equipment such as fire hoses, electric fencing and barbed wire to their ships and train their crews.

They cost the nations that maintain naval forces in the region untold billions of dollars.