II. Translate into Russian the passage describing the actions taken by pirates against the ships and their crews.

III. Vocabulary Practice

Find an odd word.

a) commandeer, seize, hijack, repel;

b) appeal, demand, accuse, request;

c) precautionary, negligible, insignificant, unimportant;

d) steal, prowl, plunder, rob.

IV. Speech Practice

1. Explain in English what the following words and word-groups mean:

hijacker; to smuggle; law enforcement; mother ship; rival warlords.

2. Explain the underlined parts in your own words.

1. Once the vessels have entered these waters, the chance of any law enforcement is negligible.

2. Many of the warlords are believed to run gangs.

3. Answer the questions to the above text.

1. What area appears to be piracy-prone (подверженный)?

2. What happened to the ships and their crews after they had been attacked by pirates?

3. What kind of crew is supposed to run the mother ship?

4. What measures could help the ships to avoid being attacked?

5. Why have the Somali waters become a piracy hot spot?

4. Sum up the information from texts 1 and 2. Describe the situation off the Somali coast according to the plan of your own.

Text 3. Captain counts the cost of piracy

I. Read the text.

Make sure you understand the words below:

tale	story
to give up	to stop

2 February, 2006

Tales of pirates seizing ships on the high seas are children's stories – real piracy has a human and financial cost, as one captain knows only too well.

Capt Rodrigues took command of a small container ship after it was attacked en route from Australia to Singapore.

When the 10-men crew heard shots in the night most of them locked themselves in their cabins but the captain and chief officer were later found shot dead.

It is believed they were killed after the pirates demanded money. The unmanned ship continued on its course for an hour and a half before the crew came out to find their shipmates killed.

When Capt Rodrigues took over the helm he had a new crew as the other men were too traumatised to return.

"We agreed everyone was on piracy watch. I never had to force anyone to go out. They were always up on the bridge".

On first boarding the ship, he said: "I told myself lightning doesn't strike twice".

But he may have thought he had spoken too soon when one night a few months later the ship was approached by a couple of speedboats off the Indonesian islands, south of Singapore. They got out the search lights and sounded the alarms.

The measures worked as the speedboats gave up their pursuit.

But he later heard pirates had boarded another ship, tied up the chief engineer and ransacked the vessel.

Capt Rodrigues said the best way to avoid being taken by pirates was to keep them off the ship.

"Once they are on board they are armed and you lose control of the ship. You are defenceless ", he said.

In Somalia, pirates are more concerned with getting a ransom rather than hijacking the ships for parts or cargo. Thirty five piracy incidents were reported in Somalia last year compared to just two in 2004.

Vocabulary

to seize	захватывать
to lock	запирать на ключ
to demand	требовать
to take over	принимать (должность, обязанности) от другого
to traumatise	травмировать
lightning	молния
search light	прожектор
pursuit	преследование; погоня
to ransack	ограбить
to keep off	держать в отдалении; не подпускать
defenceless	беззащитный, уязвимый
ransom	выкуп

II. Vocabulary Practice

Find an odd word.

a) seize, catch, smuggle, capture;

b) ransack, plunder, rob, ransom;

c) pursuit, hurry, chase, hunt.

III. Speech Practice

1. Explain the underlined parts in your own words.

1. Real piracy has a human and financial cost.

2. When Capt Rodrigues took over the helm he had a new crew as the other men were too traumatised to return.

3. Lightning doesn't strike twice.

4. But he may have thought he had spoken too soon.

5. Pirates are more concerned with getting a ransom rather than hijacking the ships.

2. Answer the questions to the text above.

1. What does piracy on the high seas involve?

2. Did the attack described have such consequences? What namely?

3. What anti-piracy measures did the new captain take before the attack?

4. How did the crew manage to repel the pirates?

5. Why is it important not to let the pirates board the ship?

 

Text 4. Освобождение сухогруза "Леманн Тимбер"
обошлось в 700 тысяч долларов

Make a free translation of the text.

09.07.2008

Освобождение (release) сухогруза "Леманн Тимбер", удерживаемого сомалийскими пиратами, обошлось компании-судовладельцу более чем в 700 тысяч долларов, сообщает "Интерфакс".

Неизвестное судно, которое должно было также передать членам экипажа воду, продовольствие и медикаменты, доставило деньги для выкупа на борт "Леманна Тимбера", однако передача не состоялась из-за плохой погоды. По информации агентства, пираты пересчитывали деньги несколько часов. Кроме того, они похитили все ценности (valuables), находившиеся на борту судна, а также личные вещи экипажа – часы и мобильные телефоны.

В настоящее время судно находится в нейтральных (neutral) водах, оно должно прибыть в порт Аден в ближайшие дни. Состояние моряков тяжелое из-за психологического шока, плохого питания и обезвоживания. Как сообщается, пираты удерживали их в помещении с высокой температурой и без питьевой воды.

Cухогруз "Леманн Тимбер" был похищен пиратами у берегов Сомали 28 мая. На борту судна находились капитан – россиянин Валентин Барташев – и члены команды – четыре украинца, эстонец и девять граждан Мьянмы (Myanmar).

Active Vocabulary

access	ear drum	praise
accuse	enforcement	prosecute
address	environment	prosecution
alarm	exhausted	protect
alert	face	prowl
attempt	fail	pursuit
attend to	findings	raider
blame	flare	ram
blast	focus	ransack
centre of gravity	frighten	ransom
charge	grenade launcher	remote-controlled
claim	guilty	rip open
clamber	haul	rival
clean-up	head	rower
commandeer	high seas	salvage
conclude	hijacker	scramble
congestion	hold captive	seamanship
contribute	human error	search light
court	hypothermia	seize
debris	ignore	sentence
dehydrated	inevitable	settle down
deliberately	invader	slack
demand	issue	slippery
deny	keep off	smuggle
dispute	lay blame	speculative
divert	lock	spilling
drag	machine gun	spot
drag the anchor	manning	staff
drilling	negligence	sweep
drive off	negligent	take over
drown	negligible	take to
dump	plunder	threatening
	point

 

Supplementary Reading

Text 1. Three die as trawler capsizesoff English coast

Three Belgians died after their fishing vessel capsizedoff the coast of Sussex.

The Zeebrugge-registered Noordster Z122 overturned in a busy shipping lane 11 miles south of Beachy Head, after it snagged its nets while trawling on Tuesday night.

The alarm was raised just after 8:30 am yesterday when the 19-year-old nephew of the skipper was spotted holding to the upturned hull.

He was rescued by a coastguard helicopter and taken to hospital suffering from shock and hypothermia.

Soon afterwards two other members of the family-run fishing business were confirmed dead.

A third man was confirmed dead at 1:30 pm and the four-and-a-half-hour search-and-rescue operation, which included four lifeboats, a Royal Navy warship and several merchant vessels, was called off.