Elhiblu 1

Elhiblu 1 is a commercial tanker. Registered in Turkey, the ship was built in 2015.[3] In March 2019, the ship was hijacked by migrants—which the ship had stopped to rescue—off of the coast of Libya. This hijacking received considerable coverage in international media.[4][5]

History
Name: Elhiblu 1
Namesake: Salah al-Hiblu, ship owner[1]
Port of registry: Turkey
Completed: 2015
Identification:
Status: Operational
General characteristics
Type: Bunkering tanker
Tonnage:
Length: 52 m (171 ft)
Beam: 8 m (26 ft)
Draught: 3.2 m (10 ft)
Speed:
  • 7.9 knots (15 km/h) (maximum)
  • 6.7 knots (12 km/h) (cruising)
AFM Special Operations Unit take back the control of the tanker.[2]

Hijacking

On 27 March 2019, the ship was hijacked by over 100 migrants who the ship had rescued from the Mediterranean.[4][5][6][7] The hijacking came after a group of men forced Elhiblu 1's captain and crew to divert course from Tripoli (where the ship was sailing to deliver the recently shipwrecked migrants) to Malta. As the ship was approaching Maltese waters, the captain was able to inform the Maltese government he was not in control of his vessel, and that "through coercive action"[8] a group of men had hijacked the ship. Elhiblu 1 was later intercepted by the Special Operations Unit of Armed Forces of Malta, which regained control of the ship and detained 5 of the alleged hijackers before escorting Elhiblu 1 to Valletta, Malta.[2][8]

References
  1. https://www.apnews.com/519554b4ec7c456288cc576e0e64c3a2
  2. "AFM Operation - 28/03/19 | Facebook". www.facebook.com. Retrieved 2019-07-26.
  3. "ELHIBLU 1 (IMO 9753258, Bunkering Tanker) - Ship Details and Current Position | Vessel Tracking". www.vesseltracking.net. Retrieved 2019-03-28.
  4. "Merchant ship 'hijacked by migrants' off Libya". 2019-03-27. Retrieved 2019-03-28.
  5. "'Desperate' situation off Libya as rescued refugees 'hijack' ship". www.aljazeera.com. Retrieved 2019-03-28.
  6. "Migrants Hijack Good Samaritan Vessel". The Maritime Executive. Retrieved 2019-03-28.
  7. "Rescued migrants hijack merchant ship off Libya". Reuters. 2019-03-27. Retrieved 2019-03-28.
  8. Squires, Nick (2019-03-27). "Maltese armed forces storm merchant ship 'hijacked by migrants' in Mediterranean". The Telegraph. ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved 2019-03-28.


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.