A luxury cruise line will re-evaluate whether to offer future cruises off the coast of Somalia after pirates attempted to attack one of its ships early Saturday.

The pirates were in two small boats and carrying machine guns and a rocket-propelled grenade when they attempted the attack on Seabourn Cruise Lines’ “Spirit” about 5:35 a.m. local time Saturday, Deborah Natansohn, president of the cruise line, told CNN Radio.

The ship was carrying 150 passengers and a crew of about 160.

The ship, she said, immediately instituted its emergency response system. “The occupants of those boats did not succeed in boarding the ship and eventually turned away … our captain and crew did a terrific job taking responsive action.”

Passenger Mike Rogers of Vancouver, Canada, said the pirates were shooting and sending rockets at the boat.

“The captain tried to run one of the boats over, but they were small boats, about 25 feet long,” he told CNN Radio affiliate CKNW in Vancouver.

“Each one had four or five people on it, and (the captain) said he was going to do anything to keep them from getting on board.”

“Seabourn ‘Spirit’ has offered itineraries in that part of the world before, but we’ll obviously be looking at the incident to determine what to do in the future,” [Deborah Natansohn] said.

Rogers said, “we’re always looking for adventure, but this is probably a little more than we would normally look for.”

You pay extra to get shot at!



  1. R.Tatmuller says:

    Isn’t this why the Navy was invented?
    Let’s free up some of that military power in Iraq and take out these pirates.
    While we are at it, send a few battalions of Marines to Paris.
    They need help too.

  2. Mike says:

    YARR!!!!

  3. gquaglia says:

    I wouldn’t send a crosant to France, much or less our military.

  4. Angel H. Wong says:

    That explains why all those trophy wives spend so much time doing Tae Bo sessions…

  5. AB CD says:

    They had rockets and grenades and lost? What was the Cruise ship carrying?

  6. K. Crouch says:

    We sailed on the Spirit for six weeks last spring. Same captain same security officer. They are two of the best afloat. Those pirates had a slim chance at best. I hope that he managed to run them down and send a message that some Americans ( and Norwegians, and Aussies) are ready and willing to fight back.

  7. James Hill says:

    I think the cruise lines are on the cusp of a money maker here.

    Oh, wait… This wasn’t planned. Cruises are still boring. Nevermind.

  8. Ron says:

    Well, it appears that next time I go crusing I may have to bring a couple grenade launchers…. No thats a bad idea. The cruise ships should have torpedoes launcher just in case pirates decide to use a bigger ship next time.


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