Indian Navy Plane Thwarts Pirate Attack
By Aiswarya Lakshmi
Thursday, April 21, 2016
The Indian Navy, with the help of its long-range anti-submarine warfare aircraft, has thwarted a "piracy" attempt in the Western Arabian Sea, 800 nautical miles off Mumbai, targeted at a merchant vessel.
According to a report in the Times of India, the P-8I, based at the naval air station INS Rajali at Arakkonam in Tamil Nadu, was on a routine surveillance mission over the Arabian Sea when it received distress calls from the merchant vessel, the Malta-flagged MV Sezai Selah, on the international Channel 16 distress radio on April 15.
"The pirate mother ship and the two high-speed skiffs had come quite close to the merchant vessel. The P-8I immediately responded and made warning transmissions over Channel 16 while flying over the pirate boats...they got frightened and altered course to leave MV Sezai Selah alone," said an official.
The eastern coast of Africa is infested with pirates who often target merchant vessels in the Arabian sea. India is among the countries who have deployed warships in the area to check piracy.