Pirates or Opportunistic Fisherman (or thirsty, innocent fisherman) and a quiz…
Pirates? Opportunistic fisherman? Innocent fisherman just looking for water or booze? How do you know? What do you do when you feel you could be in a position to be attacked? You can’t just over-react, be paranoid, and shoot anyone who comes around…But you have to be ready to protect yourself, to keep people away from your home. It’s hard to tell where, when, and what, and you may never even need to know. The majority of cruisers never have to deal with anything bad happening, or anything being stolen. But what if you are the unlucky one? We can’t just “stay away” anymore from dangerous places…dangers lurk everywhere, and we have to be more vigilant than we used to be…Take the quiz, and ask yourself what you would do…
QUIZ
There are 4 potentially dangerous situations we have personally had in the last 12 years of sailing around the world. They could have gone either way…can you guess which one or ones ended really really badly for our friends?
And later, there is a professionals advice on a few things as well…
But what would you have done in these situations…would you known which one really was dangerous? When does both or one of you lock yourself in a cabin?
- 10 people hiding under a tarp, one guy in a black hood and face mask, in a small open boat, coming fast up behind us. Waving his hands claiming to need help, we think, in a foreign language….Pulling up to side of boat, desperate to jump on. Do we let him on? Did we even have a choice? Intuition was used, judgements were made, and when we saw one lady and one kid pop up from under the tarp, we let one and only one guy on…how do you think it turned out?
2.Fishing boat anchored. You slowly sail by. They fire up the engines and start coming towards you with their small 3 boats tied to the back. There is a tradition in this area to pass one’s boat in front of your bow and get their bad fishing luck wiped out for the day. They believe in it strongly. The 3 small fishing boats are empty but on long tethers that go out like water skis and start to surround you…The men are not smiling…in fact they look quite scary and aren’t saying anything to us, only amongst themselves. What do you do with these punky looking fisherman, now standing on their bow, coming so close to your boat, in the jump position? You maneuver your boat just well enough to stop them from boarding…you let out the rest of your job and fire up your engine too. You sail, and maneuver…they speed up… and repeatedly try to get close enough to jump. They don’t communicate anything verbally.
3.A young fisherman with all his nets is out 6 miles from land as you are sailing along in the daylight. This is the same fisherman you saw back in the anchorage who that you asked, somewhat impolitely, to move his nets because they were put down on top of your anchor and you really needed to leave. Hooks and poles had surrounded your boat. He had not been happy but he had finally picked up his nets and left. Now he is throwing nets and floats aggressively in front of your boat, 6 miles out to sea. When other boats comes around he speeds off, but then comes back when they are out of sight, and does it all again. You fire a flare in his direction. He leaves, and then comes back 15 minutes later, and does it all again despite you yelling and telling him to go away. He is now putting lines around your boat, within 10 feet of the boat, cursing, and ignoring your requests to remove his nets and fishing gear. Luckily you are sailing so they probably aren’t gonna get in your prop. What would you do?
4.You are anchored and have just had an early dinner. The sun is setting, and it’s been a beautiful day. The police, with their official Police shirts and badges come up and ask you for your boat papers to be sure you are anchored there legally…standard stuff. They climb aboard. What do you do…unhappy with their black boots scuffing up your deck, and the lack of politeness?
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COMPILATION OF IDEAS FOR SELF DEFENSE ON A SAILBOAT
After all of the thoughtful comments on the last defense video, (and not so thoughtful ones too), we still aren’t sure what we want to have on our sailboat. Some we already have, but still don’t feel 100% decided and protected…maybe you never are 100% safe….
What would you have on your sailboat to protect against thieves, intruders, or pirates…hard core pirates with guns, or just from pirates who want to steal something from you? Here is a compilation of suggestions we had in the video…Other ideas? (Please go to our Video, listed below for comments as I am unable to manage comments on this here)
-Flare gun (More info on Amazon)
-parachute flares (More details)
-Molotov cocktail
-Pepperballs
-Pepper spray
-Pepper Gel (More Info on Amazon)
-AR15
-Loud PA announcing intentions
-Bow and Arrow
-sword/machete
-glass breaker balls
-Laser light
-fire extinguishers
-Blinding light
-trench knife
-Flame thrower
-a 308, a 45, shotgun, or other
-slipper/soapy deck
-barbed wire, thumbtacks
-Electric lifelines/stantions. Minimum of 1 joule suggested by Geoff Gentil, on SV Arnak in South East Asia… (Surveyor and Sailor) Here is a photo of his unit, with tester and copper ground pole which he puts in the cockpit drain…. He cautions to make sure whatever you have electricized…lifelines, stantions etc are all isolated from anything and everything else electrical on the boat, or pay the price…he has used the system for 2 years, and it has been useful! (BTW, his beautiful boat is for sale…contact me if you want details)
Here is one on Amazon’s that matches the specs
-weed sprayer with flammable liquid (on amazon.com)
-lock yourself in and let them take it all
-grenades
-wasp spray A good one on Amazon
-spear gun
-taser, tazer, tazer gun, taser gun, stun gun
-knife
-potato launcher
-escape by scuba
-frozen paintballs
-greased pole
-buzz gun
-safe room on the boat with lock, radio and epirb
-stabilized binoculars (Nice ones on Amazon)
-avoid all areas that may have any crime (ie stay at home)
-cricket bat or baseball bat
-slingshot with pepperballs
-pump action shotgun
-ammonia squirt bottle, or under pressure
-Sail fast, in to the waves and hope their boat can’t keep up with that
-Sail out further from land
- use radar and avoid all targets Raymarine at West Marine
-party poppers filled with pepper
-water gun filled with gasoline.
-Just a really good security system with the Cloak or the Sound Barrier (The Cloak)
-bars on the windows, with locks, and bars on the companionway, and stay inside, and pull Epirb, call for help on VHF, SSB, Sat Phone, GEOS Safety Solutions, Panic button on the Iridium GO, or other. West Marine for Epirb, and more…
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Tips from a Pro
Now, meet Jesse McNeilly…a recent poster on our Sailboat Defense video with some good ideas. (Video below in case you have not seen it) While we don’t feel all of his advice is perfect for every ssilboat, I’m not sure there IS any perfect advice out there. You must make the decision yourself, and prepare yourself according to what you feel will work for your skills, comfort level and cruising area. We can’t tell you what’s right, and neither can anyone else. You must think about this, and plan , and decide how much you want to leave til the moment it happens, and how much you want to do ahead of time…
He writes:
“No equipment will do much of anything without training. For evidence – check out First Person Defender (FPD) on YouTube. Proves the point.
The individuals in the video may lack the real-world experience of being under immediate life threatening danger – I’m highly sceptical of the gentleman in the store, he’s a sales rep by observation, he wants to sell products. The authors are keen but at first glance aren’t trained. Training and experience makes the outcome of a battle you pick on the ground of your choosing, that’s is; Once you step off into being a victim to being a defender, it’s all or nothing, you fight or literally die trying. The second anyone (who you target) figures out your weakness, lack of skills, non-lethal capacity… you’re fu****. They will tactically exploit your fear and previewed weakness and use it against you, inviting harm or worse as you may just piss them off in your attempt/s to protect yourself. In my view; you simply don’t know what they want – your stuff or your life essentially. In any case, I’m not waiting to find out. I’m currently in the process of developing a range of common items which on there own are innocuous – simple items you’d find around the home/boat. These are perfectly legal and on their own simple. When combined you can have a non, to lethal option. You can easily construct tools mentioned in the comments, ideally make it hard, impossible or lethal for these pirates to board your vessel and conduct their operations. In most cases they want things from you, in others they’re looking for a ransom and in others they may want to kill you (such as religious extremists). To come back to my original point. Don’t wait to find out. They MUST understand that if they are to board your vessel, they may be hurt badly, or even better killed. Some items to consider:
-Blinding lights mounted to your vessel
-Speakers which warns them that you are armed and will defend yourself. Also with an audible recording (In their language) broadcasting that you have activated emergency distress and are declaring an emergency.
-Directional blinding lights, preferably with a strobe function.
-Slippery deck soap, or, solution to make boarding difficult.
-Weed sprayer which can take flammable liquid, I’ll let your imagination work that out.
-Pikes/axes/long arm edged weapons and/or a combination
-Several fire extinguishers (Dry Chemical Powder) – careful of wind, speed and direction
-Gas masks/respirators
-Hardened openings, lockable from the inside, window covers/black out shades
-Any incendiary; liquid, solid or gas which can be used for a variety of audible, concussion, directional kenetic options and more.
If you’re gonna go ‘full pirate’ COMMIT, amp yourself up, put on some bagpipes fuken war paint and get into it, you’re (if you decide to commit that is) in a fight for your life to defend your mates, loved ones, life, kids, home etc. do it right and go 110% if you’re going to get into a brawl
-Home made body armour, thick paper, ceramics, stab vests etc etc. Look the part and play into the role you want to display – don’t go at it half arsed. Of course, these are options, you MUST practice and drill and be CONFIDENT that when push comes to shove you COMMIT. If you’re not sure, then follow standard guidelines for being a hostage; don’t resist, given them what they want, comply, comply, comply. Sus out the situation early; if there as 2 or more fast boats, 5+ pirates etc. don’t think you, your Jack Russle and your wife 50+ years in age are gonna do much of anything. It’s not home alone the movie, shit just got real and you need to work out your options in seconds. Trust your gut. Activate a distress call, EPIRB etc.
Personally, I’d never use something like a BB Gun, because if it fails you – if they (pirates) decide to board, you’ve now shown them that you’re armed and they are going to match the lethal ‘perception’ and you’ve created a false sense of security you’re now obligated to match. So what do you do now? All said, avoid areas of high threat. Plan your route and voyage. Simple practices of: ample crew, defence skills, kinetic options and a watchful attitude, hopefully, will avoid any conflict. If required commit fully to defending yourself. Rarely do attackers go for you if they think they will die or be seriously hurt, remember, they’re looking for weakness – don’t give it to them.
On a final note; STUDY, stay up-to-date with your threat landscape, the methods and behaviours of local pirates and their capabilities and general intent. This will help you plan and prepare.
Thanks for sharing guys and opening up discussion on an important topic. Respect.”
We like thoughtful comments like the one above, and hope you will let us know what you think, and which situation above you think didn’t turn out so well…and which ones were OK, if any…Any of them could go either way in real life out here cruising…What would you do? How prepared are you? Or do you feel we should just trust everyone and take what comes?
Quiz Answer: Any of these could turn sour. Any of them could end very badly. And all could end with making good friends and having a nice story to tell on your blog or YouTube channel. All of them could restore Your faith in humanity…all of them could end in a injury, death, or mental trauma.
In our friends case…the one that ended badly was #4…the one with the police…they were not really police at all, and before they could do anything at all…gun or no gun, Plan A or Plan B..their legs were tied and they were chucked overboard in to a small boat, and transported 400 miles in an open boat to a small island where they were held for 6+ months as hostages, being threatened every day by Islamic militants. Only the women made it out intact. The man suffers to this day, and the marriage is no longer…a sad ending to a love story….
Self Defense on Sailboats, against Pirates, Intruders, Thieves…
Is Cruising Safe? Panama Pirate Attack in Guna Yala/San Blas Islands
Vietnamese Pirates as seen in Blue Water Sailing, Cruising Helmsman, magazine
