Somalia — EU NAVFOR warship FS Nivôse saves Merchant vessel Nordneptun from pirates

A heli­copter from the EU NAVFOR war­ship FS Nivôse was launched against a pirate skiff lead­ing to the dis­rup­tion of a pirate attack against the mer­chant ves­sel Nord­nep­tun off Zanz­ibar, Tan­za­nia on the morn­ing of 25 May.

EU NAVFOR French war­ship FS NIVOSE and her heli­copter Source: EU NAVFOR

EU NAVFOR con­tin­ues to suc­cess­ful­ly patrol, inter­cept and dis­rupt pirate attacks through­out the EU NAVFOR area of oper­a­tions. The French EU NAVFOR war­ship Nivôse respond­ed imme­di­ate­ly to a dis­tress sig­nal from Nord­nep­tune, a tanker, which indi­cat­ed she was under small arms attack from a pirate ves­sel. As a result of the appli­ca­tion of ‘Best Man­age­ment Prac­tices ‘against pirate attack, the Nord­nep­tune was able to evade the attack. 

How­ev­er, with­in an hour, the Nord­nep­tune was under fur­ther more seri­ous attack by two pirate skiffs. In the inter­im, EU NAVFOR war­ship FS Nivôse closed with Nord­nep­tun and was now in a posi­tion to launch her heli­copter. On arrival, Nivôse heli­copter fired warn­ing shots and both skiffs gave up their attack and moved into Tan­zan­ian ter­ri­to­r­i­al waters where the Tan­zan­ian Coast Guard was alert­ed to con­tin­ue the pursuit. 

EU NAVFOR Soma­lia – Oper­a­tion ATALANTA’s main tasks are to escort mer­chant ves­sels car­ry­ing human­i­tar­i­an aid of the World Food Pro­gramme (WFP) and ves­sels of African Union Mis­sion in Soma­lia, AMISOM and to pro­tect vul­ner­a­ble ves­sels in the Gulf of Aden and Indi­an Ocean and to deter and dis­rupt pira­cy. EU NAVFOR also mon­i­tors fish­ing activ­i­ty off the coast of Somalia. 

Press release
EU NAVFOR