IDF confirms Houthis hijacked ship in Red Sea, says it is not an Israeli vessel - Galaxy Leader

Maritime News
1

The rebels descended on the cargo ship by repelling down from a helicopter, the officials said,

There are no Israelis among the crew aboard the Galaxy Leader ship. Arabic-language media outlets say there are 52 crew members aboard the vessel.

2

Is 52 a normal complement for a car carrier?

3 Likes
3

Normally around 20-24 crew.

2 Likes
4

Second article says there were 22 crew members on board,
So who are the “extras” ?

What is the cargo ?

1 Like
5

Maybe they had a riding gang doing repair work.

6

Most likely the early reporting was in error.

1 Like
7

This article confirms the number of crews as 22, mostly Pinoys and Bulgarians:

8

A spokesperson for the Houthi group said earlier Sunday that all ships owned or operated by Israeli companies, or carrying the Israeli flag could be targeted.

Ownership details in public shipping databases associated the ship’s owners with Ray Car Carriers, which was founded by Abraham “Rami” Ungar, who is known as one of the richest men in Israel.

From VOA news.

9

My Ship Security Officers course didn’t prepare me for hijacker’s rappelling down from a helicopter.

6 Likes
10

they had to see it coming on the radar? not a single crew member above deck?
without defensive arms it’d be mostly impossible to stop them. moving items onto the deck to prevent landing ,… they’d probably just shoot you?
i didn’t see any cars either? they may get some money for the ship, hard to say about the crew and yes, if they had 50 aboard it must of been quite a work party.

1 Like
11
1 Like
12

What about if they just land?

13

I should have been more specific and said if they board using a helicopter. Either way they could strafe any opposition first. I dare say that back in the day if I had mentioned hijackers using helicopters it would have been regarded as far fetched.

1 Like
14

I’m sure they saw them coming, but what is the ships crew going to do about it?

The best thing to do is surrender to the heavily armed terrorists and hope they don’t magdump their AKs into you.

4 Likes
15

A few hundred feet of cheap galvinized wire strewn about won’t stop a dedicated special operations force of a major military power from boarding your ship but it’s pretty good at keeping wanta’be commandos with a helicopter from landing aboard unopposed.

16

Idk I’d be worried about that hind having rockets, or even a HMG to light up the bridge. Surrender might’ve been the only option, though these days being a hostage doesn’t sound very survivable.

17

In an ideal world what would be the proper response, and who would do the responding?

18

I bet a creative soul with a line thrower could have worked something out…

5 Likes
19

The chopper was a Mil 8 or an 11 a “Hip” with racks for ordnance but none mounted (the two SUU-57 rocket pods look empty).

That internal top cargo deck in the vid looked empty.
Wonder what they have on board ?

20

The reporting is there was no cargo aboard.There’s no drag wake in the video, looks light to me.

1 Like