The crew of the large anti-submarine ship “Vice-Admiral Kulakov” of the Russian Navy prevented the seizure of a civilian ship in the Gulf of Guinea of the Atlantic Ocean. Seeing a Russian helicopter on the horizon, the pirates in a boat headed towards the shore at full speed. Such stories are sometimes filmed: films about the release of ships captured by pirates by the marines were filmed in Russia and in the United States. Experts note that the Russian fleet is carrying out an important mission to ensure the safety of navigation and, ultimately, world trade.
Into a tropical downpour
Northern Fleet sailors rescued a civilian ship off the western coast of Africa from a pirate attack. According to the Ministry of Defense, On October 25, the large anti-submarine ship (BOD) “Vice-Admiral Kulakov” received a distress signal from the container ship Lucia. The ship was sailing under the Panama flag from Togo to Cameroon when a group of armed men approached it in a fast boat. According to modern instructions, the team in this case should send a distress signal and lock itself in the interior, which was done.
Having received information, Russian sailors sent a Ka-27PS helicopter with a Marine Corps unit to the area of the incident. Seeing and hearing the approaching military, the eight attackers in a speedboat headed towards the shore at full speed. According to the commander of the Northern Fleet’s battleship squadron, Captain 1st Rank Stanislav Varik, the pilots flew in the most difficult hydrometeorological conditions – there was a continuous tropical downpour.
The approaching “Vice-Admiral Kulakov” sent the marines on a high-speed boat to the ship – an assault group and a cover group… They carefully examined the decks and premises of the ship and freed the crew. From the air, the fighters were covered by a helicopter, and the command controlled the situation with the help of a drone. According to Stanislav Varik, Lucia had one Russian citizen, one Romanian citizen and 20 Ukrainian citizens.
– All alive, healthy, climbed to the upper deck, warmly greeted, thanked, just rushed to hug the Marines, for salvation, – said the commander of the Northern Fleet battleship detachment, Captain 1st Rank Stanislav Varik.
Later, the ship owner, MSC, published a message expressing gratitude to the Russian fleet.
Sources of Izvestia in the military department said that the inspection of the vessel was entrusted to the soldiers of the reconnaissance battalion of the 61st Marine Brigade, as well as to the specialists of the 420th Marine Reconnaissance Point (MRP). There are such formations in every fleet; they represent a kind of naval analogue of the special forces brigades of the military districts.
Pirates of the Caribbean
– Russian sailors carry out an important mission in the fight against terrorism. And one of its forms is piracy. After all, this is essentially the same terrorism, only on the water, ”ex-Deputy Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation Sergei Ordzhonikidze explained to Izvestia. – Pirates rob ships, kill people, take crews hostage and demand ransom. Russia’s activity on the seas and in the oceans becomes a serious signal to those who are plotting attacks not only on ships flying the Russian flag, but also on any peaceful ships. Ultimately, the Russian fleet ensures freedom of navigation and facilitates world trade. It can be disrupted very easily – for example, if you carry out many pirate attacks on ships at once in one area with a lot of traffic.
The successful rescue from pirates of a container ship in the Gulf of Guinea is convincing proof that the mission of protecting peace, security and free trade is being successfully carried out by the Russian fleet, the expert added.
A detachment of ships of the Northern Fleet, which includes, in addition to the “Kulakov”, the rescue tugboat “Altai” and the medium sea tanker “Akademik Pashin”, went on a long voyage on 28 June. Taking part in the main naval parade in St. Petersburg, the BOD with support vessels circled Europe, on August 18 entered the Mediterranean Sea, made a number of visits and conducted maneuvers, on September 23 passed Gibraltar and moved south along the African coast.
Marine units accompanied ships of the USSR Navy on long voyages from the 1960s to the end of the Soviet period. Since the 2000s, Russian warships with marines on board have regularly patrolled areas of the oceans with high pirate activity.
“Attacks on civilian, first of all, merchant ships regularly occur in different parts of the planet,” military expert Vladislav Shurygin reminded Izvestia. – The highest risks for shipping are in the Horn of Africa, in the seas surrounding Southeast Asia, and in the Caribbean. Unlike the “gentlemen of fortune” of past eras, modern pirates are not interested in the contents of the hold, but in the possibility of taking the crew hostage. After a successful attack, the case most often ends with the payment of a ransom for the release of the ship and crew. In other cases, for example, when there is serious resistance or if the military appears on the horizon, the filibusters retreat.
Save Tom Hanks
The real use of military force against pirates comes in isolated cases. One of the most famous was the operation to free the container ship Maersk Alabama in April 2009. Then the attackers took the captain of the ship, Richard Phillips, hostage. Two ships of the US Navy came to the rescue, and the pirates were destroyed by sniper fire by the naval special forces. The only surviving attacker was tried and sentenced to 33 years in prison. In 2013, this story was used in the film Captain Phillips with Tom Hanks.…
Another sensational operation took place during the liberation of the tanker “Moscow University” in May 2010. After reporting the attack, the ship’s crew locked themselves in the engine room, and the Marshal Shaposhnikov BMF of the Russian Navy came to the rescue. The Marines who landed on the deck captured all the pirates alive, without suffering casualties. They took their weapons, put them in a boat and let them go home. In 2014, the Russian militant “22 Minutes” was filmed based on this operation.
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