U.S. Forces Rescue Second Iranian Vessel

WASHINGTON, Jan. 10, 2012 — For the sec­ond time in a week, a U.S. ves­sel has res­cued Iran­ian mariners from a dis­tressed ves­sel in region­al waters.

A team from the guid­ed-mis­sile destroy­er USS Kidd, part of the USS John C. Sten­nis Car­ri­er Strike Group, res­cued a 13-mem­ber Iran­ian crew Jan. 5 from 15 sus­pect­ed pirates who had been hold­ing the crew hostage on the Iran­ian-flagged Al Molai for sev­er­al weeks.

Sev­er­al hours before dawn this morn­ing, U.S. Coast Guard cut­ter Monomoy res­cued six Iran­ian mariners from the dis­abled car­go dhow Ya-Hus­sayn in the North Ara­bi­an Gulf, Pen­ta­gon Press Sec­re­tary George Lit­tle said today.

“This is con­sis­tent with meet­ing our oblig­a­tions to res­cue ves­sels in dis­tress,” he added.

Monomoy is sup­port­ing mar­itime secu­ri­ty oper­a­tions and the­ater secu­ri­ty coop­er­a­tion in the U.S. 5th Fleet area of respon­si­bil­i­ty, which includes the Per­sian Gulf, the Red Sea, the Ara­bi­an Sea and the coast off East Africa as far south as Kenya.

At about 3 a.m. local time, Coast Guard cut­ter Monomoy was hailed by flares and flash­lights from the Ya-Hus­sayn, accord­ing to a U.S. Naval Forces Cen­tral Com­mand statement.

The dhow’s mas­ter request­ed assis­tance from Monomoy, indi­cat­ing the engine room was flood­ing and the ves­sel was not sea­wor­thy. The Monomoy’s small boat res­cued two peo­ple from the ves­sel and four from a life raft tied off the dhow’s stern, offi­cials said.

Aboard the Monomoy, an emer­gency med­ical tech­ni­cian treat­ed an injured crew mem­ber, and the oth­ers received water, blan­kets and halal meals, which are pre­pared accord­ing to Islam­ic law and stored aboard U.S. Coast Guard ships for Mus­lim mariners in distress.

A civil­ian inter­preter aboard Monomoy made ini­tial con­tact with the Iran­ian Res­cue Coor­di­na­tion Cen­ter to report Ya-Hussayn’s sta­tus and to coor­di­nate the Iran­ian mariners’ trans­fer from Monomoy to shore. Civil­ian inter­preters rou­tine­ly trav­el on U.S. Coast Guard ves­sels oper­at­ing in the Ara­bi­an Gulf.

The Iran­ian vessel’s mas­ter told the Res­cue Coor­di­na­tion Cen­ter he appre­ci­at­ed the help for his crew and the efforts to get them home. “With­out your help, we were dead,” said Ya-Hussayn’s own­er, Hakim Hamid-Awi. “Thank you for all that you did for us.”

The Iran­ian mariners wished the best for the cutter’s cap­tain and crew, offi­cials said.

At 4:30 p.m. local time, the six mariners were trans­ferred by rigid-hull inflat­able boats from Monomoy to the Iran­ian coast guard ves­sel Naji 7. Through a trans­la­tor, the Naji 7’s cap­tain sent his regards and thanked the Monomoy’s cap­tain and crew mem­bers for assist­ing and tak­ing care of the Iran­ian sailors.

“Monomoy dis­played excep­tion­al skill and pro­fes­sion­al­ism dur­ing the night-time res­cue at sea,” said U.S. Navy Capt. Edward Cash­man, com­man­der of Task Force 55, to which the Monomoy is assigned. “Monomoy’s pres­ence in the North­ern Gulf and the effec­tive coor­di­na­tion of the res­cue proves again the val­ue of Coali­tion Mar­itime Secu­ri­ty Operations.” 

Source:
U.S. Depart­ment of Defense
Office of the Assis­tant Sec­re­tary of Defense (Pub­lic Affairs) 

Face­book and/or on Twit­ter

Team GlobDef

Seit 2001 ist GlobalDefence.net im Internet unterwegs, um mit eigenen Analysen, interessanten Kooperationen und umfassenden Informationen für einen spannenden Überblick der Weltlage zu sorgen. GlobalDefence.net war dabei die erste deutschsprachige Internetseite, die mit dem Schwerpunkt Sicherheitspolitik außerhalb von Hochschulen oder Instituten aufgetreten ist.

Alle Beiträge ansehen von Team GlobDef →