US, British and Canadian Navies chase pirates throughout the night

When the caught the pirates the Navies cataloged what the pirates had on their skiffs and promptly released the pirates. National Post

Sub-Lieutenant Michael McWhinnie, a spokesman onboard Winnipeg, said it, a British naval supply ship and U.S. warship Halyburton all responded after pirates attacked the 80,000-tonne MV Front Ardenne in the Gulf of Aden late Saturday.

The gunmen, who were armed with assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, fled south in their skiff as the NATO forces approached, dumping most of their weapons overboard.

McWhinnie told Reuters a helicopter dispatched by the Winnipeg fired several warning rounds in front of the pirates' small craft from its machine gun, but they ignored it.

This is the part when the helicopter is suppose to blow the pirate skiff out of the water. But we're talking about the new and improved politically correct Navy.

The Canadian warship then pursued them for hours through the night, extinguishing its lights to hunt the gang in the dark.

"We blocked their path. We were faster and surprisingly more manoeuvrable than the pirate skiff," McWhinnie said by phone from the Winnipeg to the Corte-Real, a Portuguese warship that is also part of NATO's anti-piracy mission in the area.

Winnipeg then sent a boarding party to search the pirate vessel and found a round for a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, which they seized.

"Most weapons went over the side but they must have overlooked it when they started discarding objects," he said. After documenting the evidence they let the pirates go.

Sigh...