Real Pirates of the Caribbean
This is an amazing story. This email was sent to me from Don and Kelley, Bay Breeze Community Members, who are currently cruising aboard their 49' Liberty sloop off Columbia
I Survived A Pirate Attack - written by Fritz Ponsen, Don & Kelley's guest aboard Piper III
There has been much in the news lately about piracy, but very rarely do the sailors who have experienced pirate attacks first hand get the opportunity to speak for themselves, and share their story. So, for the safety of all our friends sailing the oceans of the world, here is the full account of our experience at the hands of pirates, and how we survived a pirate attack.
I spent three weeks in Colombia South America a couple of years ago with one of my old sailing buddies in Detroit who’s name is Donald. I traveled alone, and in hindsight it was probably good that my wife did not go along...
Donald and Kelley, his significant other, have been living and cruising on their 49 foot Liberty sailboat named PIPER III around the Caribbean for many years. PIPER III hails from Elizabeth Town (New Jersey USA), and is currently cruising the Caribbean as I write this.
When I arrived in Cartagena I moved on board PIPER III which was conveniently located at the Club de Pesca near the city center. After spending a week in beautiful Cartagena we provisioned, untied the dock lines, and headed into the Caribbean for the Baru peninsula and Islas Rosaria about 30 miles south of Cartagena for some serious R&R.
One evening, around 8:30 pm, while at anchor in a beautiful bay off the Baru peninsula, we were below preparing a meal of filet mignons and trimmings. It was my turn to cook, and we were drinking lots of wine and chatting in the cabin’s 95 degree heat with hatches and windows wide open. We should have been on deck barbequing but I had insisted on searing these steaks in clarified butter.
While we were having a great time below, three young local young men had quietly approached PIPER III in the dark - with what we assumed to be a row boat or dug-out canoe - and had climbed aboard through the open aft cabin window. PIPER III is a center cockpit boat with an aft cabin, and there is a narrow and dark passage way on the port side connected to the main cabin where we were at the time.
Without warning we were interrupted by angry shouted commands in Spanish, which none of us understood, and facing the long barrel of a shot-gun. The pirates could only approach us in single file, and the long shot-gun barrel’s movements were restricted in the narrow passage. The galley is on the opposite side from the passage, and as I was in the galley, I was out of the line of sight of the gunman. I looked around the corner to see what Don and Kelley were looking at with wide eyes and where the Spanish voice came from and for one terrifying moment I thought “oh f-ck, pirates, we may die here!”
Donald, who is 6’5” and tips the scale at 250 plus pounds, acted within seconds of the announcement. While these guys were still confined in the narrow passage way he jumped the first guy with the gun, grabbed the gun barrel, and while yelling randomly and incoherently at the top of his lungs, he wildly beat the shit out of the first guy and physically forced all of them (we figured there were three or four) back to the aft cabin. In the scuffle one of them managed to hit Don on the head with his machete.
Facing a wild-eyed Englishman was more than they could stand, and they leaped back out the same way they came, disappearing into the dark. Kelley, who heroically was right behind Donald keeping up her end of the yelling and hitting, said that she managed to grab the last one by the “balls” and squeezed hard while he was climbing through the window. She said that there was not much there...
All this happened without any heroics on my part since I was caught in line behind Don & Kelley. All I saw was assholes and elbows. By the time I got on deck they had disappeared in the dark.
As we assessed the damage we found that Donald was bleeding profusely from a head wound sustained during the fight, but it turned out to be superficial. Kelley used to be an army nurse and she professionally patched him up.
Now, here is the amazing part. During the scuffle Donald had managed to take the gun and a machete away from the wannabe pirates before they escaped! After closer inspection we found the gun loaded with a single live shell, but the gun was in such poor shape that we were not sure if it would have fired at all. Still, it was a shotgun and looked real enough in the dark confines of the cabin. The machete was certainly real enough.
We issued a radio mayday to the Colombian Coast Guard but after waiting for 2 hours, they seemed particularly unconcerned. The final tally was that Donald had lost his wallet which was on the aft cabin dresser, containing one debit card (we canceled it) and about $20 US in Pesos.
In our discussions after the action was over we agreed that, due to Don’s immediate reaction while they were still confined and unsure of conditions on board, the situation was never allowed to develop to where the pirates had us under their control. What also helped to keep them off balance was Don’s top-of-his-lungs yelling as he physically attacked them.
Of course there was that moment when I watched in horror when Donald crossed the short distance between him and the assailant while the gun was still pointed at him. It took several moments cover the distance and to wrestle the gun away from the guy. The reality is that guy could have fired the gun during these moments, but fortunately he did not.
When we examined the gun we found that the breech would not lock, and it may have been impossible to fire the gun without it coming apart in the operator’s hands. This may have been the reason for the gunman’s reluctance to fire, but we will never know for sure.
We assume that on the day the pirates attacked us they had scoped us out by blending in with the local vendor fleet who sell their wares of seafood and trinkets to the visiting yachts. One of them was a particularly rickety looking canoe kept afloat through continuous bailing by one of the three men on board. Unlike many of the other vendors, they offered fresh seafood for sale, but had none on board.
The next day we discussed our adventures with one of the vendors and they seemed genuinely angered by this development and wanted descriptions of the perps. They were worried that as news of piracy in this local bay spreads via the yachting grapevine it will discourage other yachts from visiting the bay, cutting into their business. We stayed in the bay for one more very pleasant day before sailing on.
As I reflected on the event, the words “they came in through the bedroom window” kept surfacing and I decided to set down new lyrics to a popular Beatles song off the Abbey Road album:
Ballad of Bandito Boarding in Baru by Frits Ponsen
Melody of: "She Came in Through the Bathroom Window", The Beatles, Abbey Road.
They came in through the bedroom window
Poorly armed with a rusty gun
They planned to rob the crew of Piper
But they failed and they had to run
Refrain:
Didn’t anybody tell them
Didn’t any of them see
The wrath of the captain was upon them
The wrath of Donald made them flee
One bandito had a machete
He hit the captain on the head
The blood was gushing from the head wound
Causing Donald to get bloody mad
Repeat Refrain
The crew of Piper fought with valor
The crew of Piper took no crap
Captain Donald lost a wallet
The banditos took the rap
Repeat Refrain
So we called the Baru police department
To file an incident report
The polizontes were indifferent
They could listen but were no support
Didn’t anybody tell them
Didn’t any of them see
The wrath of the captain was upon them
The wrath of Donald made them flee
- I Survived a Pirate Attack by Frits Ponsen and Kelley Blasco exclusively for YachtPals.com
I Survived A Pirate Attack - written by Fritz Ponsen, Don & Kelley's guest aboard Piper III
There has been much in the news lately about piracy, but very rarely do the sailors who have experienced pirate attacks first hand get the opportunity to speak for themselves, and share their story. So, for the safety of all our friends sailing the oceans of the world, here is the full account of our experience at the hands of pirates, and how we survived a pirate attack.
I spent three weeks in Colombia South America a couple of years ago with one of my old sailing buddies in Detroit who’s name is Donald. I traveled alone, and in hindsight it was probably good that my wife did not go along...
Donald and Kelley, his significant other, have been living and cruising on their 49 foot Liberty sailboat named PIPER III around the Caribbean for many years. PIPER III hails from Elizabeth Town (New Jersey USA), and is currently cruising the Caribbean as I write this.
When I arrived in Cartagena I moved on board PIPER III which was conveniently located at the Club de Pesca near the city center. After spending a week in beautiful Cartagena we provisioned, untied the dock lines, and headed into the Caribbean for the Baru peninsula and Islas Rosaria about 30 miles south of Cartagena for some serious R&R.
One evening, around 8:30 pm, while at anchor in a beautiful bay off the Baru peninsula, we were below preparing a meal of filet mignons and trimmings. It was my turn to cook, and we were drinking lots of wine and chatting in the cabin’s 95 degree heat with hatches and windows wide open. We should have been on deck barbequing but I had insisted on searing these steaks in clarified butter.
While we were having a great time below, three young local young men had quietly approached PIPER III in the dark - with what we assumed to be a row boat or dug-out canoe - and had climbed aboard through the open aft cabin window. PIPER III is a center cockpit boat with an aft cabin, and there is a narrow and dark passage way on the port side connected to the main cabin where we were at the time.
Without warning we were interrupted by angry shouted commands in Spanish, which none of us understood, and facing the long barrel of a shot-gun. The pirates could only approach us in single file, and the long shot-gun barrel’s movements were restricted in the narrow passage. The galley is on the opposite side from the passage, and as I was in the galley, I was out of the line of sight of the gunman. I looked around the corner to see what Don and Kelley were looking at with wide eyes and where the Spanish voice came from and for one terrifying moment I thought “oh f-ck, pirates, we may die here!”
Donald, who is 6’5” and tips the scale at 250 plus pounds, acted within seconds of the announcement. While these guys were still confined in the narrow passage way he jumped the first guy with the gun, grabbed the gun barrel, and while yelling randomly and incoherently at the top of his lungs, he wildly beat the shit out of the first guy and physically forced all of them (we figured there were three or four) back to the aft cabin. In the scuffle one of them managed to hit Don on the head with his machete.
Facing a wild-eyed Englishman was more than they could stand, and they leaped back out the same way they came, disappearing into the dark. Kelley, who heroically was right behind Donald keeping up her end of the yelling and hitting, said that she managed to grab the last one by the “balls” and squeezed hard while he was climbing through the window. She said that there was not much there...
All this happened without any heroics on my part since I was caught in line behind Don & Kelley. All I saw was assholes and elbows. By the time I got on deck they had disappeared in the dark.
As we assessed the damage we found that Donald was bleeding profusely from a head wound sustained during the fight, but it turned out to be superficial. Kelley used to be an army nurse and she professionally patched him up.
Now, here is the amazing part. During the scuffle Donald had managed to take the gun and a machete away from the wannabe pirates before they escaped! After closer inspection we found the gun loaded with a single live shell, but the gun was in such poor shape that we were not sure if it would have fired at all. Still, it was a shotgun and looked real enough in the dark confines of the cabin. The machete was certainly real enough.
We issued a radio mayday to the Colombian Coast Guard but after waiting for 2 hours, they seemed particularly unconcerned. The final tally was that Donald had lost his wallet which was on the aft cabin dresser, containing one debit card (we canceled it) and about $20 US in Pesos.
In our discussions after the action was over we agreed that, due to Don’s immediate reaction while they were still confined and unsure of conditions on board, the situation was never allowed to develop to where the pirates had us under their control. What also helped to keep them off balance was Don’s top-of-his-lungs yelling as he physically attacked them.
Of course there was that moment when I watched in horror when Donald crossed the short distance between him and the assailant while the gun was still pointed at him. It took several moments cover the distance and to wrestle the gun away from the guy. The reality is that guy could have fired the gun during these moments, but fortunately he did not.
When we examined the gun we found that the breech would not lock, and it may have been impossible to fire the gun without it coming apart in the operator’s hands. This may have been the reason for the gunman’s reluctance to fire, but we will never know for sure.
We assume that on the day the pirates attacked us they had scoped us out by blending in with the local vendor fleet who sell their wares of seafood and trinkets to the visiting yachts. One of them was a particularly rickety looking canoe kept afloat through continuous bailing by one of the three men on board. Unlike many of the other vendors, they offered fresh seafood for sale, but had none on board.
The next day we discussed our adventures with one of the vendors and they seemed genuinely angered by this development and wanted descriptions of the perps. They were worried that as news of piracy in this local bay spreads via the yachting grapevine it will discourage other yachts from visiting the bay, cutting into their business. We stayed in the bay for one more very pleasant day before sailing on.
As I reflected on the event, the words “they came in through the bedroom window” kept surfacing and I decided to set down new lyrics to a popular Beatles song off the Abbey Road album:
Ballad of Bandito Boarding in Baru by Frits Ponsen
Melody of: "She Came in Through the Bathroom Window", The Beatles, Abbey Road.
They came in through the bedroom window
Poorly armed with a rusty gun
They planned to rob the crew of Piper
But they failed and they had to run
Refrain:
Didn’t anybody tell them
Didn’t any of them see
The wrath of the captain was upon them
The wrath of Donald made them flee
One bandito had a machete
He hit the captain on the head
The blood was gushing from the head wound
Causing Donald to get bloody mad
Repeat Refrain
The crew of Piper fought with valor
The crew of Piper took no crap
Captain Donald lost a wallet
The banditos took the rap
Repeat Refrain
So we called the Baru police department
To file an incident report
The polizontes were indifferent
They could listen but were no support
Didn’t anybody tell them
Didn’t any of them see
The wrath of the captain was upon them
The wrath of Donald made them flee
- I Survived a Pirate Attack by Frits Ponsen and Kelley Blasco exclusively for YachtPals.com
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Nancy Harrison on -
Having known Donald and Kelley for several years I have no doubt Donalds outburst scared the hell out of them. Glad to hear they are all ok. I would not want to be on the other end of the englishmans rage. By the way HI to Kelley and Don. Yes I am stil at CYOA.
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