Three more American maritime reconnaissance aircraft sent to the Seychelles to combat pirates
Strategy Page
Three more American P-3 maritime reconnaissance aircraft have been sent to the Seychelles islands, to search for pirates. Beginning last Summer, the United States has had one P-3 and at least one Reaper UAVs operating from the Seychelles islands, to search for Somali pirates operating far from their bases. One of these Reapers has been seen carrying a large pod under one wing. This appears to be a reconnaissance camera pod, that can take digital photos of large areas of water, over a hundred kilometers from the aircraft. Ideally, you want a maritime reconnaissance aircraft to carry a surface search radar, but this pod does not appear to be a radar. Moreover, a surface search radar would require much more electricity than a camera pod.
Since late last year, Somali pirates have been operating as far east as the Seychelles, which are a group of 115 islands 1,500 kilometers from the east African coast. The islands have a total population of 85,000 and no military power to speak of. Except for a small coast guard, they are defenseless against pirates. So are many of the ships moving north and south off the East Coast of Africa. While ships making the Gulf of Aden run know they must take measures to deal with pirate attacks (posting lookouts 24/7, training the crew to use fire hoses and other measures to repel boarders, hanging barbed wire on the railings and over the side to deter boarders), this is not so common for ships operating a thousand kilometers or more off the east coast of Africa. Ships in this area were warned late last year that they were at risk. Now, the pirates are out in force, demonstrating that the risk is real.
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