Navy, Air Force foil pirate attack

The Ghana Navy and Air Force have foiled an attempted pirate attack on an oil tanker off the coast of Takoradi.

The oil tanker vessel, MT Hafnia Phoenix, escaped the pirate attack some 72 nautical miles off the coast of Takoradi last Tuesday after undertaking a manoeuvre to outwit an armed gang of pirates.

The Denmark-flagged vessel, which was sailing from Lomé in Togo to Abidjan in Cote d’Ivoire, was attacked by the group of about 10 and riding in a skiff (river craft) carrying a ladder — known to be an essential tool that enables easy access into hijacking of vessels in sail.

Briefing the Daily Graphic, the Chief of Naval Staff, Rear Admiral Seth Amoama, said the pirates escaped narrowly as the navy and Air Force staged a joint operation to counter them.

He said although the military aircraft used for the exercise was able to locate the tanker vessel, the attackers managed to escape.

There was also another attempted attack last Saturday on a tuna vessel, Agnes 1, within Ghana’s Exclusive Economic Zone.

The Chief of Naval Staff said the navy and its stakeholders would step up their operations to ensure that the threat was dealt with within the zone.

He expressed confidence that a retooling project being undertaken by the government — aided by the adoption of technology — would enable the navy and its stakeholders to meet operational requirements of surveillance and detection, particularly when the criminals often changed their modus operandi.

MMCC Report

A report on the incident from the Multinational Maritime Coordination Centre (MMCC) Zone F office indicated that after the failed pirating attempt, the relevant stakeholder agencies intensified beach combing operations along the coast to locate the suspected pirate skiff, while vessels at sea were informed to remain vigilant and look out for suspicious skiff/craft movements.

The Togolese and Ivorian authorities were also informed of the incident since indications were that the attackers could be seen at open sea or anchorages of the two countries.

“The MMCC Zone F wishes to assure the international community and the maritime industry that the Ghana Navy and navies across Zone F and E are closely monitoring the situation at sea and are on high alert, while extra measures have been taken to prevent pirates from gaining a foothold, especially in Zone F,” the report indicated.

Modus operandi

Rear Admiral Amoama said the piracy business had become a lucrative venture where criminal gangs operated very far from land of about 150 to 200 nautical miles with the assistance of mother ships — a large ship from which smaller craft is launched for an operation.

“The suspicion is that the skiff might have been aided by a mother ship as the facilitator to launch the botched attack, considering that they lacked the capacity to travel very long distance from land to the sea to carry out their attack and quickly return back to the vessel to avoid being detected,” Real Admiral Amoama said.

He said while vessels of 300 tonnes were required by international regulations to have an Automatic Identification System installed on board to help track their movement from any maritime operation centre, persons engaged in the piracy business often switched off their identification systems to avoid being tracked, saying it had become a major concern for stakeholders in the region.

To be able to effectively reduce the attacks, the navy and its collaborators, he said, would require satellite imagery technology which was able to identify and track vessels, as well as patterns of illegal activities on sea and along the coasts.

“This technology is, however, very expensive, and countries within the Gulf of Guinea have not been able to make any investments in them yet it is in use in some developed countries,” the Chief of Naval Staff stated.

Ransom

Rear Admiral Amoama said ransom negotiations had become the norm as kidnapping had become an attractive cooperative venture for pirates.

Pirates, he stressed, often demanded nearly $50,000 minimum in ransom per crew member kidnapped, and this, he said, was affecting Ghana’s fishing industry which recorded two separate attacks in June and August 2020, with two Koreans presently being held captive in the Niger Delta as the Korean Embassy in Ghana continued to negotiate for their release.