A new resource offering the latest guidelines can help increase your yacht’s chances of a safe passage through the Red Sea.
On a delivery job from Dubai to Sardinia, the captain was on the bridge of Easy Target as the yacht made her way through the Gulf of Aden towards the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait. He noticed a small boat persistently trailing him in the distance. He altered course and increased his speed, and the boat duly followed. Scanning the horizon with binoculars, he spotted another small craft, then another, until seven more boats closed in, ultimately flanking the yacht in a pincer formation. There was nowhere to go but forward as fast as possible; at 18 knots the engines were at their max and the yacht was throwing a large wake that would make it difficult for the narrow skiffs to get close to the swim platform, but with their powerful outboards, the small craft easily kept up. For hours, they gave chase, slowly creeping closer in, until darkness fell and the yacht’s port engine couldn’t take any more and overheated. Crippled, Easy Target slowed, now at the mercy of the pirates.
While this hypothetical scenario represents the worst case, a number of yachts have reported being chased in the Gulf of Aden region, such as the 154-foot Heesen Asya, which frequently transits the Red Sea, and a non-identified yacht that made the news last November for being shadowed by 12 boats for hours.
The good news? “No vessel with an armed security team on board has ever been boarded by pirates,” says Chris Farrell, commercial director of Neptune P2P Group, a former British Special Forces-owned and -managed company that provides security advice, mitigation and guards for vessels in the Red Sea, Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean. “We are there as a security team to keep the threat away from the boat. We don’t want them getting close enough to be able to get alongside the boat or to get on board.”
His company has aided more than 10,000 vessels through the region in the last 16 years. And while he says there have been “a lot” of incidents on board merchant vessels, with superyachts, any unusual activity or suspicious approaches have never amounted to anything thanks to the security on board.
Somali piracy in the northwest Indian Ocean has declined from its high in 2011 yet is making a resurgence in the wake of the Houthi anti-shipping campaign, according to the Maritime Industry Security Threat Overview (MISTO). During the 12 months from November 2023 to November 2024, 43 attacks took place against fishing dhows and commercial ships, of which 19 were successful hijacks.
The Houthis are currently the region’s biggest threat. Since November 2023, they have changed the landscape of this crucial shipping corridor, attacking more than 100 vessels in protest at Israel’s military operations in Gaza. In July this year, within weeks of sinking two Liberian-flagged ships, they announced the fourth phase of their naval blockade: targeting any ship that is associated with a company that does business with Israel. As their mission has been to disrupt shipping, superyachts historically have not been targets, but any yacht with ties to Israel is vulnerable, and yachts in transit have come close to crossfire.
It’s a concern that Chris fields almost daily. In addition to armed insurgents in skiffs, the Houthis attack with anti-ship cruise missiles, anti-ship ballistic missiles, drones and remotely operated skiffs laden with explosives. The anti-ship ballistic missiles particularly have limited accuracy. Mistaken identity is also a possibility, Chris says. “You could be going through that area and while you aren’t the target, you end up being targeted because you’re close to a vessel that has an affiliation to Israel.”
In addition, he points out the fact that yachts can change hands regularly, so there could be outdated information online that links a yacht to Israel. “So that still makes you a target, because the Houthis are using open-source information.” Intelligence analysts at Neptune P2P Group do a full affiliation check for vessels they protect, looking at ownership structure, history and historical port calls.
Further complicating matters, “Houthi forces are often masquerading as Yemeni Coast Guard or Navy officials,” states MISTO. Just prior to the onset of the Houthis’ campaign, motor yacht Kalizma was involved in a shoot-out with unidentified vessels that later claimed to be Yemeni Coast Guard; it was never fully resolved exactly who was responsible for the bullet holes in her superstructure.
Captains have a new resource in Best Management Practices Maritime Security, to be used in conjunction with MISTO, with the first edition published in March 2025. Produced by the International Chamber of Shipping, together with 40 supporting maritime organizations, it consolidates all regional guidance into a comprehensive document that offers guidelines in how to detect, avoid, delay, deter and report attacks and incidents.
With attackers’ motivations varying from criminal to ideological or political, threats are made up of three elements, it says: capability, intent and opportunity. And while no shipmaster can influence capability and intent, with the right security measures they can minimize opportunity.