The first time a pirate chase happened to me at sea, that night was pure madness.
It was around past midnight, somewhere in WAHRA—West Africa High Risk Area, around the Gulf of Guinea when the piracy alarm sounded. It was midnight and this alarm was serious; we couldn’t be having a drill at that time, I thought. I immediately jumped out of my bed, peeked outside my cabin, and saw that everyone was running into the citadel. I jumped into my boiler suit immediately, at least to keep me warm just incase we got hijacked. The citadel can be cold.
When we all assembled at the citadel, the captain and the bridge team had already deployed the maneuvering technique. Apparently, a mother vessel had been tailing us, changing course when we changed and increasing speed when we increased speed. That was when the alarm was sounded.
We all stayed in the citadel for another two hours until we were sure we’d lost them. It was a crazy night. One that I cannot forget.
Sailing is a crazy job.