Reported by Cornell Sailing – organizers of the Atlantic Odyssey
Here is a report of a robbery on one of the yachts in the Islands Odyssey – Norwegian yacht Spinnwill.
Armed Robbery, piracy on board, S/Y Spinnwill, at Porto da Praia Bay, Ihla de Santiago
Date: 13th November 2017.
At 1 after midnight, three pirates armed with knives entered the yacht and threatened to cut the throats of the crew and owner of the yacht if they did not get all the money.
They also stole telephones, cameras, drone, computers, tabs, hard-disks, shoes, alcohol, measuring instruments, one jacket and so on.
One pirate also peed on floor and pillows.
The owner was tied to the mast inside the boat, and the crew was taken, hostage. They stole the dinghy with an outboard to escape to land.
They were unfamiliar with the outboard and had to row.
The owner managed to use Houdini skills he didn’t know he had to untie all knots and alarmed the Port Police and Police over VHF. The Police waited for the robbers on the beach. As far as we know, one was arrested as he swam ashore.
They left almost all the stolen items, as they jumped into the water to avoid the Police, but some items are still missing or lost.
Crew and Owner are both OK and will witness in court tomorrow to send them to jail.
Safe sailing everyone!
From Spinnwill.
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Also, Yacht Zaria was attacked on 2 November while at anchor off the fishing harbour, Praia. Three men armed with knives swam to the boat and took computers, telephones, radios, cash, sextant, sailing jacket, iridium go. The skipper called police on VHF 16 but no answer. Skipper identified two of the robbers to the police but was never invited to testify. Praia is best avoided, or else keep a vigilant anchor watch and some deterrents.