Some people have said this couple were foolish to sail in Somail waters. Well they were almost 1000 miles off the shores of Somalia and only 115 miles from the Seychelles at the time of the attack.
Here's auseful link which gives a bit of insight into this sorry saga.
It cost the taxpayer a lot of money to send out a crack team of highly trained SBS marines to rescue the chandlers (amongst other expensive operations relating to this incident).
It appears that, just when the team were on the point of going in and sorting out these pirates, who were aboard a hijacked large merchant vessel "Kota Wajar", someone on high back in the UK gave the command to stand down!?
The article suggests that the marines aboard the large naval ship the "Wave Knight" were exasperated as they were ready to go and had trained thoroughly for this scenario. The pirates hadn't realized that the ship, which was 100ft alongside them in the darkness, was a fully loaded naval vessel with highly trained teams champing at the bit ready to go aboard to take them out. The marines felt very confident that they could have easily taken the pirates out and that the Chandlers would have been safe because they were the pirates' only bargaining chip.
So my questions are; Who made the decision to stand down and why? Why do we pay out a fortune to train these brave men, if we then don't let them carry out the tasks for which they have been trained?
Why hasn't Admiral Stanhope been brought to account for misleading the public over what happened? He made it seem like nobody had witnessed the hostage taking and that it was only by chance that they had found the yacht.
A year on and the Chandlers are still held in captivity with no resolution in sight. Seeing as several attempts to resolve the issue have been prevented, the outlook for them seems bleak.
What a hell this must be for the Chandlers!
