A rare show of humanity from Somali pirates has seen a critically ill crew member medevaced from a hijacked vessel which has been used as a mothership.
The unprecedented move involved naval forces approaching the 24,100-dwt chemical tanker Hannibal II (built 1983) on Friday morning to rescue the man reportedly suffering appendicitis.
The identity of the ill seafarer is not known but he is understood to be Tunisian. The rescue took place off the Puntland pirate stronghold of Garacad where several other hijacked ships are also being held.
“The Tunisian master of the ship contacted the authorities on 16 December stating that he had a crew member with severe stomach pains on board and requested assistance,” a statement from counter-piracy task force EU NAVFOR read.
“He also stated that he had reached an agreement with the pirates allowing the sick man to be picked up and transferred to a navy ship for treatment if a transfer could be arranged.”
Both German and Thai warships responded to the call and the man was put onto a rigid hulled inflatable boat and taken to the Thai vessel TNS Pattani. From there he was whisked by helicopter to the FGS Hamburg which “had more suitable medical facilities,” the statement read.
The patient’s current condition is unknown.
The Panama-flagged tanker was hijacked in the Indian Ocean on 11 November while en route from Malaysia to Suez with a cargo of vegetable oil. Its 31 crew comprises 23 Tunisians, four Filipinos and one each from Russia, Georgia, Croatia and Morocco.
It has recently been known to have been used as a mothership by its captors from which to attempt further hijackings in the Indian Ocean.
It has since returned to Garacad, however, where some five other hijacked ships are thought to be currently held. These are the 4,000-dwt Iceberg I (built 1976), the 13,300-dwt German chemical tanker Marida Marguerite (built 2008), the 22,400-dwt Chinese vessel Yuan Xiang (built 1978), the 44,400-dwt Bangladeshi bulker Jahan Moni (built 1996) and the 17,330-dwt Egyptian ship Suez (built 1984), which is just south of Garacad.
TradeWinds also reports on Friday that shipowners are now faced with a large scale expansion of the area where vessels are excluded from annual war risk cover. This is due to the increasing use by Somali pirates of hijacked merchant vessels as motherships from which to stage further attacks in previously benign areas of the Indian Ocean and elsewhere in the region.
