Just when it seemed that pirate attacks on merchant ships in the Gulf of Guinea had stopped, a new wave of kidnappings has taken place off equatorial Guinea.That raised the alarm about the possibility of further piracy in the area.
Pirates hijacked the Tonsberg container ship en route from China to West Africa last night, with nine crew members kidnapped, foreign media reported.
The cargo from the container ship was mainly from The Chinese cities of Shanghai, Ningbo, Shenzhen and Guangzhou.
Reports said the container ship was en route from Kribi in Cameroon to Cotonou in Benin.
Pirates have attacked container ships in the Gulf of Guinea, about 48 nautical miles southwest of Equatorial Guinea, kidnapping as many as nine crew members.
As of 13 December UTC, the ship was floating near the attack site, with Danish frigate ESBERN SNARE nearby.
The 5,551 TEU Tonsberg (IMO: 9216999, MMSI 636020348) was built in 2001 (20 years old) and currently flies the Liberian flag.It was a container ship chartered by France’s CMA in June.
Data show that the container ship serves the well-known asia-West Africa route Asia-West Africa (WAE) in the industry, and connects to many domestic ports such as Shanghai, Ningbo, Shekou and Nansha as well as the largest international transit port — Singapore port.
According to the large shipping schedule data, the co-deck carriers are ANL, CMA CGM, CNC, MAERSK, MCC, SEAGO and SEALAND.
As the cargo on board is from major Chinese ports, export and freight forwarding companies that have recently shipped this ship to West Africa via France CMA and Maersk need to pay special attention to the impact of this hijacking incident on the subsequent shipping delays!
It follows a pirate attack in late October on the MSC Lucia, a container ship bound for Togo in West Africa.
The Crew of the MSC Lucia reported that the pirates had boarded the ship and were hiding in the engine room, and the Russian military quickly responded by sending a KA-27PS helicopter with an anti-terrorist squad aboard.
Upon seeing the approaching Russian military helicopter, “the pirates left the ship, boarded a speedboat and headed at full speed toward the coast,” the Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement.
Marines from the Vice Admiral Kulakov then boarded MSC Lucia to investigate the ship for safety.
In response, the European Shipowners’ Association warned that the threat from piracy remains high and called on the international community to do more to protect merchant shipping.
Post time: Dec-15-2021