Today's Pirates Hearken to 'Golden Age'

This map shows all the piracy and armed robbery incidents reported to the IMB Piracy Reporting Centre during 2009. Red shows attacks, yellow represents attempted attacks, and purple indicates suspicious vessels. Credit: Google/TerraMetrics/NASA/Data SIO/NOAA/U.S. Navy/NGA/GEBCO/Europa Technologies

From Live Science:

While Americans watch closely to see if Capt. Richard Phillips of the Maersk Alabama can be rescued from pirates off the coast of Africa in the Indian Ocean, maritime officials have tracked at least eight additional acts of piracy and armed robbery at sea in just the past 10 days.

The International Maritime Bureau has tracked these incidents off Somalia, in the Gulf of Aden, in the Arabian Sea and off Malaysia since April 1. Five of those incidents involved successful hijackings or robberies. In the other cases, ship masters were able to make evasive maneuvers or helicopters intimidated the pirates into aborting their attempts.

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