Pirates!

After leaving Saigon, we docked in Singapore for a day to refuel. Leaving the tip of the Malaysian peninsula, we went up through the Straight of Malacca which is a very thing strip of water between Malaysia and Indonesia. It is also the most heavily pirated body of water in the world.

At the beginning of the trip the rumor was that we had a private security detail onboard with a full-blown armory on the eighth deck. In case of a pirate attack, security officers would man machine guns and protect the ship. Well unfortunately it turns out that we do not have any big guns onboard, and that our only weapon against pirates is in fact high-pressure water hoses.

Apparently two years ago there was a group of pirates that attempted to board the ship. They tried to throw ropes up to the fifth deck to climb and the crew was easily able to keep them off the ship by spraying them from above. The accounts I’ve heard about the pirates make them sound like a rag-tag bunch of idiots. I’m guessing that they can rob little fishing boats, but can’t really do much with a big ship like ours.

We had students on alternating four-hour shifts of “pirate watch” from the top deck throughout the passage of the Straight. We heard that one small boat did in fact come close and scope our ship out, but then left. Aargggh!