Maersk Alabama hijacking

The Maersk Alabama hijacking began on 8 April 2009, when four pirates in the Somali Basin seized the Danish/U.S. cargo ship Maersk Alabama at a distance of 240 nautical miles (440 km; 280 mi) southeast of Eyl, Somalia. The siege ended after a rescue effort by the United States Navy on April 12.
The incident was the first successful pirate seizure of a ship registered under the U.S. flag since the early 19th century. Many news reports cited the last pirate seizure as being during the Second Barbary War in 1815, although other incidents are believed to have occurred until at least 1822. It was the sixth vessel in a week to be attacked by pirates, who had previously extorted ransoms of tens of millions of dollars.
At the time of the hijacking, Maersk Alabama was owned by the Danish shipping company Maersk Line. The ship has since been acquired by Element Shipmanagement SA and has been renamed MV Tygra. As of 2025, the ship is still in active service.
The story of the incident was reported by Captain Richard Phillips, who had been master of the vessel at the time of the incident, in the 2010 book A Captain's Duty, which he co-wrote with Stephan Talty. The book was later adapted as the U.S. 2013 film Captain Phillips, starring Tom Hanks.
With a crew of 23 and 17,000 metric tons (19,000 short tons) of cargo, the ship, originating from Salalah, Oman, was bound for Mombasa, Kenya, after a stop in Djibouti. The Maersk Alabama was carrying 401 containers of food aid from USAID, Serving God Ministries, the World Food Program, and Catholic Relief Services. The food aid was destined for people in Somalia and Uganda, Somali refugees in Kenya, and refugees in Rwanda.
The crew members of Maersk Alabama had received anti-piracy training from union training schools and had drilled aboard the ship a day prior to the attack of 8 April. Their training included the use of small arms, anti-terror, basic safety, first aid, and other security-related courses.
On 8 April 2009, four pirates based on FV Win Far 161 attacked the ship. Armed with AK-47 assault rifles, all four of the pirates were between 15 and 18 years old, according to Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. When the pirate alarm sounded, Chief Engineer Mike Perry brought 14 members of the crew into a secure room that the engineers had been fortifying for such a purpose. As the pirates approached, the remaining crew fired flares. In addition, Perry and First Assistant Engineer Matt Fisher swung the ship's rudder, which swamped the pirate skiff.
Nonetheless, the ship was boarded. Perry had initially taken main engine control away from the bridge and Fisher had taken control of the steering gear. Perry then shut down all ship systems and the entire vessel "went black." The pirates captured Captain Richard Phillips and several other crew members minutes after boarding, but found that they could not control the ship.
Perry, armed with a knife, remained outside the secure room lying in wait for the pirates who were trying to locate the missing crew members in order to gain control of the ship and presumably sail it to Somalia. Perry tackled their ringleader, Abduwali Muse, and took him prisoner after a cat-and-mouse chase in a darkened engine room. Muse, whose hand was cut during the altercation, was then tied up and his wounds treated by Second Mate Ken Quinn.
Later, after suffering in the overheated secure room for hours, the crew attempted to exchange Muse for Phillips, but the exchange went awry and the pirates did not release Phillips after Muse was released. When Phillips escorted the pirates to a lifeboat to show them how to operate it, the pirates fled in the lifeboat with Phillips as a hostage and $30,000 in cash taken from the safe of the Maersk Alabama.
On 8 April, the United States Navy guided-missile destroyer USS Bainbridge and the guided-missile frigate USS Halyburton were dispatched to the Gulf of Aden in response to the hostage situation, Halyburton carrying two SH-60B Seahawk helicopters on board. The ships reached Maersk Alabama early on 9 April. Maersk Alabama was then escorted from the scene to its original destination of Mombasa where Captain Larry D. Aasheim took command of the ship. Phillips had relieved Aasheim nine days earlier. CNN and Fox News quoted sources stating that the pirates' strategy was to await the arrival of additional hijacked vessels carrying more pirates and additional hostages to use as human shields.
A stand-off began on 9 April between Bainbridge, Halyburton, and the pirates on the lifeboat from Maersk Alabama with Phillips held hostage. The lifeboat was covered and contained plenty of food and water but lacked basic comforts, including a toilet or ventilation. Bainbridge was equipped with a ScanEagle unmanned aerial vehicle and rigid-hulled inflatable boats. Both vessels stayed several hundred yards away, out of the pirates' range of fire. A P-3C Orion surveillance aircraft secured aerial footage and reconnaissance. Radio communication between the two ships was established. Four foreign vessels held by pirates headed towards the scene. A total of 54 hostages were on two of the ships, citizens of China, Germany, Russia, the Philippines, Tuvalu, Indonesia, and Taiwan.
On 10 April, Phillips attempted to escape from the lifeboat, but was recaptured after the captors fired shots. (Phillips later stated this was not an escape attempt.) The pirates then threw a phone and a two-way radio dropped to them by the U.S. Navy into the ocean, fearing the Americans were somehow using the equipment to give instructions to Phillips. The U.S. Navy dispatched another amphibious assault ship, USS Boxer, to the site off the Horn of Africa. The pirates' strategy was to link up with their comrades, who were holding various other hostages, and to get Phillips to Somalia where they could hide him and make a rescue more difficult for the Americans. Anchoring near shore would allow them to land quickly if attacked. Negotiations were ongoing between the pirates and Commander Frank Castellano of the Bainbridge and FBI hostage negotiators. The captors were also communicating with other pirate vessels by satellite phone.
However, negotiations broke down hours after the pirates fired on Halyburton not long after sunrise on Saturday, 11 April. The American frigate did not return fire and "did not want to escalate the situation". No crew members of Halyburton were injured from the gunfire, as the shots were fired haphazardly by a pirate from the front hatch of the lifeboat. "We are safe and we are not afraid of the Americans. We will defend ourselves if attacked", one of the pirates told Reuters by satellite phone. Phillips' family had gathered at his farmhouse in Vermont awaiting a resolution to the situation. Later that day, Maersk Alabama arrived in the port of Mombasa under U.S. military escort. The FBI then secured the ship as a crime scene. Castellano stated that as the winds picked up, tensions rose among the pirates and "we calmed them" and persuaded the pirates to be towed by the destroyer.
On Sunday, 12 April, US Navy SEAL Team Six snipers of Red Squadron fired shots from Bainbridge's fantail, killing the three remaining pirates after Muse had boarded the Bainbridge to negotiate a deal. Captain Phillips was rescued uninjured. Commander Castellano, with prior authorization from higher authority, ordered the action after determining Phillips's life was in immediate danger, citing reports that a pirate was pointing a rifle at Phillips's back.
$30,000 in cash from the Maersk Alabama that the pirates had stowed in the lifeboat was not found. The NCIS and the FBI investigated two members of the SEAL team's Red Squadron, but no charges were brought and the money was not recovered.
One of the pirates killed was Ali Aden Elmi, the last name of another was Hamac, and the third has not been identified in English-language press reports. The film based on Phillips's book names the three Walid Elmi, Nour Najee, and Adan Bilal. Their bodies were later turned over by the U.S. Navy to unidentified recipients in Somalia.
Two former Navy SEALs have claimed participation in the rescue: Matt Bissonnette (using the nom de plume Mark Owen) and Robert J. O'Neill. Both also participated in Operation Neptune Spear that killed Osama bin Laden.
Muse, the surviving pirate, was held in USS Boxer's afloat brig and was eventually flown to the United States to stand trial. Prosecutors brought charges in a federal courtroom in New York City that included piracy, conspiracy to seize a ship by force, and conspiracy to commit hostage-taking.
Muse's lawyers asked that he be tried as a juvenile, alleging that he was either 15 or 16 years old at the time of the hostage-taking, but the court ruled that Muse was not a juvenile and would be tried as an adult. He later admitted that he was 18 years old, and pleaded guilty to hijacking, kidnapping, and hostage-taking charges in lieu of piracy charges. He received a prison sentence of 33 years and 9 months.
In 2009, 11 of the 20 former crew members of the Maersk Alabama sued the ship's owner, Maersk Line Limited, and operator, Waterman Steamship Corporation, for allegedly knowingly and intentionally sending the ship into pirate-infested waters near Somalia. Despite warnings to stay at least 600 miles away from the coast due to pirate activity, Phillips had moved the ship within 250 miles of the coast, which the crew members said put their lives in jeopardy and that the companies did not provide adequate security for their employees. The lawsuit was later settled out of court for an undisclosed amount of money.
Just weeks after his rescue from the Somali pirates, the American talent agency Creative Artists Agency (CAA) signed Phillips and auctioned off his life rights to the publishing and film industries in the spring of 2009.
American publisher Hyperion Books optioned the rights for Phillips' memoir in May 2009. On April 6, 2010, A Captain's Duty: Somali Pirates, Navy SEALS, and Dangerous Days at Sea, was released.
Columbia Pictures acquired the film rights in May 2009 also. In March 2011, it was announced Tom Hanks would star as Phillips, Barkhad Abdi as Abduwali Muse, and Faysal Ahmed as Nour Najee in a film based on the hijacking and Phillips' book. It was scripted by Billy Ray, and produced by the team behind The Social Network.
The film, titled Captain Phillips, was released on October 11, 2013 and had its premiere showing at the 2013 New York Film Festival. It was praised for its direction, screenplay, production values, cinematography, and for the performances of Hanks and Abdi, with Abdi winning a Bafta award for Best Supporting Actor. Captain Phillips grossed $107.1 million in North America and $111.7 million in other countries for a worldwide total of $218.8 million, against its budget of $55 million.
The owners of Maersk Alabama donated the bullet-marked 5-ton fiberglass lifeboat upon which the pirates held Captain Phillips hostage to the National Navy UDT-SEAL Museum in Fort Pierce, Florida, in August 2009. The lifeboat had recently been on loan to National Geographic for its "Real Pirates" exhibition at the Nauticus marine science museum in Norfolk, Virginia.
The producers of the Captain Phillips film visited the Museum while re-creating the lifeboat and interiors for the set. An example of the Boeing Insitu ScanEagle used to monitor the crisis is also on display. The actual ScanEagle used in the mission is on display along with shell casings at the Museum of Flight in Seattle.