Benerson Little

News of Ships, Sailors, and the Sea
February, 2008
www.benersonlittle.com

Sonar and Sea Mammals. A Federal judge has ruled that the US Navy must comply with the National Environmental Policy Act and an injunction preventing the Navy from operating sonar in a twelve nautical mile zone off Southern California. The ruling confirms the injunction, which President Bush attempted to overrule when he issued a waiver on January 15, 2008, directing the US Navy to ignore it. The judge also expressed concern about the constitutionality of the waiver issued by President Bush. Environmentalists, backed by marine scientists, have lobbied for years to limit the use of high power sonar, which is believed to seriously harm whales and dolphins. The Navy is concerned that the limitation will restrict its ability to train the crews of ships and aircraft to locate enemy submarines. (Military.com)

Sea Lions Killed at the Galapagos. Fifty-three seal lions were recently found slaughtered on Pinta Island in the Galapagos. All of the animals had been struck in the head by a blunt object. Motive is unknown, for the animals’ skins, teeth, and genitals were intact. The latter two are often used in Chinese medicine. (BBC, 29 Jan 08) Galapagos sea lions have been hunted in the past, including by buccaneers who would render their fat into oil, and would sometimes make their teeth into dice.

Japanese “Research” Vessels Hunt Whales. Japanese whalers continued their Antarctic whale hunt after Greenpeace vessels departed to refuel. In previous weeks, the whalers, under the guise of hunting whales for the purpose of research, were unable to kill any whales due to the persistent interference by Greenpeace vessels. In December 2007, Japanese whalers abandoned plans to hunt humpback whales in Antarctica. Earlier in 2007, the International Whaling Commission condemned the Japanese scientific whale hunt. The claim of research is widely seen as a mere guise under which to conduct whaling. (BBC) See also http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/

Wrecks and Storms

Vessels Wrecked Off the British Coast. The Riverdance ferry, Bahamian registry, was run aground by a large storm wave off Blackpool, England. Helicopters, as well as lifeboats of the RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution), were dispatched to the stricken vessel. Her crew was eventually rescued by helicopter. (BBC, 01 Feb 08)

In the same storm the British-registered Spinningdale trawler ran aground on one of the Outer Hebrides. Her Spanish crew was unable to abandon ship due to the storm’s winds of 70 mph or more. All of the crew was rescued; four were hospitalized with hypothermia. (BBC, 01 Feb 08)

Staffed entirely by volunteers, the RNLI mans 233 lifeboat stations along the coasts of Great Britain and Ireland, and operates a fleet of highly seaworthy rescue craft that includes inflatables, rigid inflatables (RIBs), several classes of motor lifeboats, and even some hovercraft. The organization was founded in 1824. See also http://www.rnli.org.uk/home/home

Ferries. Storms and ferries continue to be a deadly combination in many developing countries. Substandard vessels are often used as legitimate ferries and as smuggling craft. In many nations refugees attempt to immigrate or enter illegally via these vessels. For example, the New York Times reported on December 1, 2007, that 80 of 126 Somali refugees drowned when their boat foundered in the Gulf of Aden.

Guidance Regarding Rescue at Sea. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) have published a pamphlet intended for “masters, ship owners, government authorities, insurance companies, and other interested parties involved in rescue at sea situations,” to provide “guidance on relevant legal provisions, and on practical procedures to ensure the prompt disembarkation of survivors of rescue operations, and measures to meet their specific needs, particularly in the case of refugees and asylum-seekers.” The document is available for download in .pdf format at http://www.imo.org/




Communication Cables. Work is underway to repair two underwater cables in the Mediterranean. The breaks have significantly disrupted internet service to parts of India and the Middle East. Anchor dragging is the most likely culprit, although the exact cause has yet to be determined. (BBC, 5 Feb 08)

Piracy

Attack on a Private Yacht. Pirates made two attempts to board a yacht off Sri Lanka on January 29, 2008, but were driven off when the yacht crew fired shots into the air. Within the past week, pirates have approached ships via speedboats, small wooden hull craft, and by swimming. Weapons included knives, “long knives,” and firearms. Eleven acts of piracy or attempted piracy were reported 29 January to 4 February 2008. (IMB Piracy Report)

2007 Piracy Report. The International Maritime Bureau (IMB) 2007 Piracy Report is available at http://www.icc-ccs.org/main/publication.php Weekly piracy reports are posted at http://www.icc-ccs.org/prc/piracyreport.php The IMB Piracy Reporting Centre is a division of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Commercial Crime Services. The Straits of Malacca, the Somali Coast, the Arabian Sea and adjacent waters, and Nigerian waters continue to have the greatest number of reported incidents of piracy and attempted piracy.

Drug Smuggling

West Africa. The French navy seized ninety-two barrels of cocaine aboard the ship Blue Atlantic on the high seas off Liberia. (According the 1958 UN Convention on the High Seas, “[T]he term “high seas” means all parts of the sea that are not included in the territorial sea or in the internal waters of a State.”)* The ship’s registry was Liberian, her nine member crew Ghanaian. Ship and crew were turned over to Liberian authorities. The BBC reports that Latin American drug cartels often use West Africa, with its largely unguarded coastline and weak law enforcement agencies, as a stop between the Americas and Europe. (BBC, 1 Feb 08)

West African waters can be dangerous. In 2007, West African pirate attacks ranged from Western Sahara to Angola along the West African coast, although most took place off Nigeria, and the International Maritime Bureau’s Piracy Report advises mariners “to exercise extreme caution” in Nigerian waters. More broadly, West African waters are known for piracy, drug smuggling, large scale illegal fishing, and arms smuggling.

Caribbean. The US Coast Guard notes that cocaine smugglers have shifted much of their operations to the Pacific, due to bilateral agreements with Caribbean and Latin American nations, permitting the Coast Guard to operate in their waters. Cocaine is now often smuggled in liquefied form, and often in semi-submersible craft whose low profile reduces their radar signature and visual profile, making them more difficult to spot. (BBC, 7 Dec 07)

Naval Special Warfare

Medal of Honor Awarded to Navy SEAL. On October 23, 2007, President Bush awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously to Navy Lieutenant Michael P. Murphy. Lieutenant Murphy’s citation reads in part: “For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty as the Leader of a Special Reconnaissance Element with Naval Special Warfare Task Unit AFGHANISTAN on 27 and 28 June 2005.” During a reconnaissance mission to discover the location of a high value militia leader, Lieutenant Murphy’s unit location was revealed by Taliban sympathizers. Pinned down, and in terrain in which he was unable to make radio contact, Lieutenant Murphy moved to open ground, without cover, to call for support. He continued to engage the enemy until he was himself killed in action. Only one member of the four man element survived. Eight more Navy SEALs, part of a reaction force coming to the aid of their beleaguered teammates, were killed when their helicopter was shot down. See also http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,154238,00.html

Navy SEAL Killed in Exercise. Petty Officer Second Class Shapoor Alexander Ghane Jr. was killed during a close quarters battle (CQB) training exercise on January 30. Training accidents are common in SEAL Team, given the hazardous combination of diving, firearms, explosives, and air operations, and perhaps as many as two thirds of all Naval Special Warfare deaths occur in training exercises.

Special Operations Patrol Craft. The prototype for a carbon-Kevlar composite hull version of the Navy’s eighty-two foot MK V Special Operations Craft. Current hulls are aluminum, and crew and troops aboard in high sea states are typically bruised and battered by the beating the vessel takes. The new hull material is intended to reduce the impact of the boat when transiting at speeds up to 50 knots. Navy SEALs typically operation in adverse conditions, and require craft that can hold up in these conditions, while at the same time keeping SEALs fit for their mission when inserted. (For more details, see Military.com, 15 Jan 08.)

Ephemera

Splinters and Round Shot. One of the past year’s episodes of the television show “Mythbusters” investigated and “busted” the myth that splinters from cannonballs killed more men in battles during the age of sail than did the cannonballs themselves, or that splinters were more dangerous than cannonballs. (I have heard the former statement, but never the latter.) In rebuttal, first, regarding a minor matter of terminology, at sea a cannonball is called a round shot. Second, and pertinent to the show’s conclusion, the most common statement regarding splinters in battle during the age of sail is that more men were injured by them than by round shot. And indeed this latter is actually true in most cases, and not a myth, as the show inaccurately reported. At close range, a round shot (an iron “cannonball”) with a full powder charge behind it will punch through light timbers, such as those used in the demonstration on the show, and leave a clean hole. However, at longer ranges, and particularly in the case of large caliber round shot with reduced powder charges, timbers will splinter dangerously. Rather than provide an extensive and overwhelming list of firsthand accounts of the deaths and horrific wounds caused by splinters, the following quote from A Treatise on Naval Gunnery by General Sir Howard Douglas (London: John Murray, 1860, page 68) should suffice: “The prodigious ravages occasioned by splinters, in naval actions, are such, that we should study as much as possible, consistently with other views, to reap the fullest effect from so destructive an agent; and this depends very much upon the degree of velocity with which the balls penetrate.” General Douglas was referring to solid iron round shot--the common “cannonball.”

And While We’re On the Subject… Another episode of “Mythbusters” concluded that no matter how hard a superhero punched a villain, a ring on his or her hand could not leave its impression in the villain’s skin. Pig skin was used to simulate human skin, and a machine did the punching. Pig skin, however, is not only very tough, but in the demonstration was also very much deceased. On the other hand, living human skin actually is susceptible to impressions, and anyone who has slept on a loosely woven blanket can attest to this after looking in the mirror and seeing the blanket’s pattern on their cheek. Soccer players describe being hit so hard with a soccer ball that it left an impression, including the manufacturer’s name, in their skin for hours or even a day, and I myself have been hit so hard in the face when fencing that the mesh of an ill-fitting fencing mask cut into the skin of my upper lip and left a bleeding, precisely cross-hatched impression of the mask’s mesh. The hosts would probably have had better results had they ventured their own skins for the tests.

* A copy of the United Nations Convention on the High Seas is available at http://untreaty.un.org/ilc/texts/instruments/english/conventions/8_1_1958_high_seas.pdf


Copyright Benerson Little 2008