A crude oil tanker which was sailing around 21 nautical miles SouthWest off Bonny Island in Nigeria, was approached by pirates, on 1st of November. The tanker managed to escape, according to IMB.
While underway, the lookout onboard the tanker noticed two speed boats approaching at high speed. The office on board immediately raised the emergency alarm and the Master notified the terminal, which informed a Nigerian naval ship.
“As the speed boats closed to the tanker, guns and ladders were sighted,” IMB informed.
The Master immediately ordered the crew to secure all access to the vessel and retreat into the citadel. After this, the bridge team commenced evasive manoeuvre to prevent the pirates from boarding.
At that time, the pirates saw the approaching naval ship and aborted the attempted boarding.
As IMB reported, the tanker continued her passage and all crewmembers were reported safe.
This is the second incident off Nigeria in the last two weeks. Specifically, On October 21st eight pirates boarded the container ship ‘Demeter’ and kidnapped six crewmembers, while the ship was sailing off Bonny Island, Nigeria.
The attacks in Nigeria confirm the report of IMB about the dangerous situation that Nigeria is facing. According to this report, a total of 20 reports against all vessel types were received for Nigeria, in 2017, 16 of which occurred off the coast of Brass, Bonny and Bayelsa. Guns were reportedly used in 18 of the incidents and vessels were underway in 17 of 20 reports. 39 of the 49 crewmembers kidnapped globally occurred off Nigerian waters in seven separate incidents. Other crew kidnappings in 2017 have been reported 60 nautical miles off the coast of Nigeria.