Although piracy has been around since nations have
engaged in maritime trade, the scale and focus of attacks in
and around the Horn of Africa has attracted significant
attention over the past few years. The publicity reached a
peak in April 2009 following the seizure of the Maersk
Alabama and the direct involvement of the US Navy in the
release of the ship's Captain. The extent of piracy in the
Gulf of Aden and waters adjacent to Somalia led to the
formation of Combined Task Force 151 (CTF151) to conduct
anti-piracy operations.
As part of their task force activities, the Royal Australian
Navy's Hydrography and METOC branch
began to analyze whether any weather-dependent patterns could be identified in the timing and
distribution of piracy attacks. The study commenced with
accessing the NGA piracy database and overlaying the
location of each attack on the long-term climate average for
monthly mean significant wave height (a measure of the
combined height of the locally wind driven sea and the
underlying long wave swell).
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