Ok seriously what are we going to do about all these pirates? First a ship loaded with grain, now a fully loaded oil tanker? Then it turns out there are dozens of others that we don't even hear about?
But they are too far out to sea to send ninjas... so what to do? I vote airstrike.
The owner of the ship, Vela International Marine, said the 25 crew members on board were safe.
The company said response teams had been established and were working to ensure the release of the crew and the vessel, which was seized by pirates on Saturday.
The president of the company, Salah Kaaki, said it was working with relevant embassies while awaiting further contact with the pirates.
Does "response teams" mean navy?
Nato and other international warships have increased patrols around northern Somalia to try to deter the heavily armed Somali pirate gangs who have seriously disrupted one of the world busiest shipping lanes. The pirates are holding about a dozen vessels hostage and more than 200 foreign crew. They are believed to have already netted more than £20m in ransoms this year.
Most of the captured ships were attacked in the Gulf of Aden, which connects the Red Sea to the Arabian Sea. But the seizure of the Sirius Star, a new ship more than 300 metres long and weighing three times as much as a typical aircraft carrier, took place in unpatrolled waters, hundreds of miles south of Somalia, at a latitude intersecting with Tanzania.
The ship was on course to sail around the Cape of Good Hope to the US when it was seized. The oil on board represents more than a quarter of Saudi Arabia's daily output. News of the hijacking caused the price of oil to jump by more than $1 a barrel.
In a typical pirate attack, a gang of young Somali men in a high-powered speedboat ambush a passing ship, firing automatic weapons and even rocket propelled grenades if an order to stop is ignored.
Captain Pottengal Mukundan, the director of the International Maritime Bureau (IMB), said the distance from the shore where the Sirius Star was attacked meant the pirates must have launched their skiff from a "mother ship" they had previously seized.
"The huge size of a vessel does not seem to daunt the pirates," he said. "It shows their high degree of audacity and resources."
Graeme Gibbon Brooks, managing director of Dryad Maritime Intelligence Service, said the pirates probably did not know how much oil the ship was carrying. "They have hit the jackpot," he said.
