Superyachts Resist Pirates By Using Yacht Transport Ships

Piracy fears are stopping superyacht owners from sailing between the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf, where they split their time each year.

Instead, they have them shipped on cargo vessels, says Erwin Bamps, the chief operating officer of the UAE boatbuilder Gulf Craft. “This is an issue for superyachts visiting the region coming out of the Mediterranean,” Mr Bamps said.

“They are now more or less shipped on another ship and brought into the Gulf, so the owner doesn’t have to concern himself with the security of the vessel. It has a cost implication for the owner, because before he would sail in through the Red Sea.”

Somali pirates have attacked hundreds of vessels in the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea over the past decade. But Bamps said the threat had little impact on boat sales in the UAE, as most superyacht owners here tended to keep their vessels in the Gulf or off the coast of Oman.

“Unless you go down to the Horn of Africa people are not so concerned,” he said. “Most of the concern is for ocean-going vessels that are crossing between continents, rather than staying around the area here.

“A lot of people only use their yacht to go from Dubai to Abu Dhabi. They see it as a floating property, a floating palace. It’s seen as an alternative to high-end dining.”

Mr Bamps said the yachting culture in the Gulf was different from that in the Mediterranean. In Europe, owners tended to cruise along a coastline for two weeks at a time, whereas most yacht trips in the Gulf last less than a day.

Source: The National