Ay Jim lad, piracy isn’t what it use to be!

My wife Karin commented, “You’d think they’d get the message by now!”  Indeed, you think that Somali pirates would get the message.  On Saturday, January 14, 2012 we find that the British RFA (Royal Auxiliary Fleet) Fort Victoria, supported by the U.S. Navy destroyer, the USS Carney intercepted a Somali dhow off the Somali coast.  British Royal Marines boarded the dhow after it failed to comply with requests to stop, 13 suspected Somali pirates with weapons were captured in the bridge section of the dhow.  This was not the first brush with the Royal Navy the Somali’s had – or with any other Navy for that matter.  Earlier in the week we heard of Iranian fishermen rescued from Somali pirates by the American navy – on two separate occasions.

On January 13^th it was reported that six Somali nut-burgers, sorry, pirates were arrested after they tried to hijack the flagship of the European Union’s naval force patrolling off the Horn of Africa.  They opened fire on members of the crew – oops!  The Spanish crew fired back and the silly sods were later captured.

RFA Fort Victoria has been busy in that part of the world, capturing Somali pirates in various operations.  Nor are they alone in this task.  HMAS Toowoomba (yep, you read that right) it’s the Royal Australian Navy, received a distress call from the Merchant Vessel BBC Portugal (no the ship, not the TV station), off the coast of Yemen.  After boarding a suspect vessel the Australians recovered an RPG, six AK47 Assault Rifles and a G3 Assault Rifle. Despite claims of innocence, the Australians replied that given the nature of the weapons recovered it was unlikely the men were engaged in fishing – Paul Hogan was not among them.

One bunch of Somali Pirates intent on no good found themselves confronted by an Oldham lad (yep a lad from my home town).  Corporal Martin Murray and his team of Commandos captured the pirates and their ammunition packed boat and blew the crap out of it!  The Somalis were later released, but given a clear message that they ignored – much to their regret.  Pirates engaged in firefights have been killed or wounded – they were first to open fire, but losses among naval vessels as far as I can trace are none.  As Karin asked, when will the Somalis get the message?