If they were conducting a ship boarding, would they not have a support vessel near? Why not drop them on top of the ship from a helicopter? Very strange.

https://www.businessinsider.co...cally-reports-2024-1

2 US Navy SEALs are missing after one fell off a boat in choppy water during a nighttime mission near Somalia, report says

Two Navy SEALs are missing after one fell into the water near Somalia on Thursday, reports say.
A search-and-rescue operation is still underway.
Reports say the pair were boarding a vessel when one fell, and the other jumped in to help.

Two Navy SEALs are missing off the coast of Somalia after one fell into the water during a nighttime boarding mission on Thursday, US officials told the Associated Press.

The pair were climbing aboard a vessel while on a mission in the Gulf of Aden when high waves knocked one into the sea, the AP reported.

The second SEAL jumped in after him as part of Navy SEAL protocol to help a comrade in danger, the report said, and they both vanished.

The US Central Command said in a statement Friday that a search-and-rescue mission was underway to find two sailors, though it did not specify that they were SEALs.

The officials spoke to the AP on the condition of anonymity.

The Gulf of Aden has been a focal point of Navy activity in recent weeks. Still, officials told the AP and The Washington Post that the incident wasn't related to the ongoing United States response to Houthi-led attacks on shipping in the Red Sea or to Iran seizing an oil tanker.

But two US officials later told the Post that the two sailors were sent to search for suspected Iranian weaponry heading for the Houthis in Yemen.

The details of the Navy SEALs' mission and which vessel they were trying to board are still unclear, though it's known that pirates roam the coast of Somalia hunting for cargo ships to hijack.

The Post reported that the US forces were often working with other nations on counter-piracy missions in the area, which sometimes included boarding vessels to ensure they had proper credentials and weren't transporting illicit goods.

The AP reported that the US Navy had often conducted such interdiction missions to intercept weapons on ships heading for Houthi-controlled Yemen.

Centcom said the two sailors were "forward-deployed to the US 5th Fleet (C5F) area of operations supporting a wide variety of missions."

The National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told CBS's "Face The Nation" on Sunday that the search was "still ongoing" and that the vessel had been involved in a "normal interdiction" operation to try to disrupt the flow of weapon supplies to Yemen.

"It's not related to the strikes that we took against the Houthis," he said.

Prayers for them and their families. This operation has to be on of the most high risk a SEAL could perform. Interdicting a ship in rough surf at night. I'm sure they were fully outfitted making them heavy. Reading that his swim buddy automatically jumped in after him makes my eyes well up. Heroes.

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Reading that his swim buddy automatically jumped in after him makes my eyes well up. Heroes.

That part of the story really caused me to pause and think. Protocol is that if a man goes overboard, the next man in line automatically goes in after him without hesitation.

Amazing these men.

One more example of how being a member of the armed forces can be dangerous to one's health and safety—not to mention that some jobs are far more dangerous than others.

Very bad news if this is correct story. It’s possible 1st guy slipped/hit by wave etc and was knocked out(no bump helmets?) but no inflatable vest and locator beacon on either SEAL ? God bless those warriors. Hoping for a positive result.

Sad to hear this.
I hope it isn't a case of trying to limit the damages to the terrorists on the boat by boarding and apprehending, when sinking it could have been more effective and safer for our folks.

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Originally posted by 220-9er:
Sad to hear this.
I hope it isn't a case of trying to limit the damages to the terrorists on the boat by boarding and apprehending, when sinking it could have been more effective and safer for our folks.

According to the article, the SEAL’s had to board to ship first to verify both the arms and the lack of paperwork, before they could sink it. Which they did.

Prayers sent that the search and rescue is successful.

Silent

quote:

Originally posted by Ronin1069:

quote:

Reading that his swim buddy automatically jumped in after him makes my eyes well up. Heroes.

That part of the story really caused me to pause and think. Protocol is that if a man goes overboard, the next man in line automatically goes in after him without hesitation.

Amazing these men.

In a recent thread about our military, many stated that today they wouldn’t do it again with the state of military leadership. I stated I would do it again. Men like this is the reason why. And our military is still full of soldiers, sailors and Marines just like them.

Prayers that these heroes come home!

I wish more people understood that we have Americans in harms way all around the world all the time. May they all come back home.

Former Navy Seal Chadd Wright discusses this.

https://youtu.be/zL2mNb8hews?si=EZzP-7htwzaZPmG_

quote:

Originally posted by wcb6092:
If they were conducting a ship boarding, would they not have a support vessel near? Why not drop them on top of the ship from a helicopter? Very strange.

Lots of info that we're not aware of.

Whatever vessel they deployed from is going to be aways off for a variety of reasons, mainly to stay out of 'range' of the boarding vessel and to allow for maneuver.

As for why not use a helo to deploy from....a helo may not have been available. Not every boarding requires a dynamic entry. The boat/ship they were boarding may have had too many 'items' sticking up in the air like antennas, wires, lines, flags that could cause problems. Using a helo you're limited to the number of bodies you can get onboard vs coming aboard from a boat or, two...which brings up another question, was there a second boat either in-support or, with the other half of the boarding team?

There's just a lot we don't know at this point

I’ve fallen off two ships during boardings.

1. Jumping back to my small boat to get a drill/boarding kit to search a vessel for hidden compartments. I stepped, the coxn backed down at the same time and I stepped into space. Hit the water, actually struck a shark about a foot down and pushed off, grabbed the bow and pulled myself aboard the 41 footer. Only my boot and pants leg got wet but it scared the shit out of me. And yes the boarding officer laughed at me when I returned. So di the sponge boat crew. There were no drugs.

2. I was boarding a container vessel off of Charleston who reported recovering 4 people who were in a raft. A rung on the Jacob’s ladder broke, I fell about 30-40 feet into the ocean, thinking the whole way down-I hope the boat moved(I didn’t want to land on it). I hit the water, I had an ALICE pack with all our gear on my back, and my PFD saved me. I’d have sunk with twenty extra pounds of gear. The people were from Cuba and had waited until one of the guys wife died so no one would be victimized when they fled.


I hope that their water safety training saved them, but I’ve heard it was rough out, diminishing their likelihood of recovery.

I have searched for a man in the seas more than once. The likelihood of finding someone is incredibly small. Imagine looking over the ocean for a volleyball (because that’s the size of a head-and a head is all that sticks out) in heavy weather. Hypothermia occurs even in relatively warm water, fairly quickly.

Fair winds and following seas men.

This hits home for me. My heart goes out to the families and the shipmates.

We lost a marine overboard on October 7th, 1994 off the coast of Jebel Ali. We were in the same shop. We went to school together in NAS Millington, TN and again in MCAS Tustin. We were then assigned to the same squadron and then the same MEU (15th) He was night crew and I was day crew. I saw him one hour before he died during shift change.

He fell overboard off the flight deck in the middle of the night while we were anchored and his body was never recovered. He was knocked unconscious before hitting the water. Rescue divers and boats were sent out but never found him. We had to pull anchor and leave that night because it looked like Saddam was going to make another run at Kuwait. We left another ship from the ARG behind to keep searching to no avail.

Two years later we lost another marine to a helicopter crash in Kuwait. He was aircrew and was burned alive in the wreckage. The two pilots and crewchief survived.

Both of these individuals died doing the same job I did .

Yes, some jobs are more dangerous than others. Going overboard is always a big deal and I've seen how these SEALS and other special teams are loaded up while performing these special missions. Between the loadouts and the sharks, it's not a good outlook.

Prayers for these two brave men.

Tony.

Two is one, one is none.

The true measure of the man is the willingness to risk all to save a brother, without hesitation, reservation, or consideration of peril.

Entirely plausible....



His example of a dhow, is mildly misleading. Dhow's come in a variety of sizes, what he showed is a smaller variety, there are much larger open water sized cargo dhow's which would require a Jacob's Ladder to board, versus simply pulling up along side and jumping the gap.

quote:

Originally posted by MikeinNC:
I’ve fallen off two ships during boardings.


I hope that their water safety training saved them, but I’ve heard it was rough out, diminishing their likelihood of recovery.

I have searched for a man in the seas more than once. The likelihood of finding someone is incredibly small. Imagine looking over the ocean for a volleyball (because that’s the size of a head-and a head is all that sticks out) in heavy weather. Hypothermia occurs even in relatively warm water, fairly quickly.

Fair winds and following seas men.

PFD's and C-SAR Strobe Lights help. only if you're awake to activate them (a human head can bounce off of a lot of stuff on the way down). A strobe light, even with an IR filter (because someone is using Night Vision) can be seen for a long way away.

I know the new, high-speed stuff is much better, lighter, smaller... than what we were using in the 90's. Fell off one or two boats during training. The PFD is the ONLY thing that kept my skinny ass above water.

Me, personally... I would have been fine with "Two missing Sailors off the coast of Africa..." as the headlines. People shouldn't know certain things like what SEAL's, or anyone else in SOCOM does or where they do it.

Hopefully these two show up drinking in some tavern in the Seychelles!
Fingers crossed!

There are numerous options available to recreational sailors to assist in SAR like EPIRBs, Personal Locating Beacons, VHFs with Digital Signal Calling, various deployable MOB markers. Would these SEALs have carried anything similar to assist in recovery, or would that make them vulnerable? Reports I’ve seen are silent on this subject, perhaps for good reason.

A bit more info and pics....

Yemen-Bound Missile Parts, Sensor Systems Seized In SEAL Raid

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A dhow was boarded in the Gulf of Aden where various weapons components were seized, and two Navy SEALs went missing during the operation.

The U.S. military has offered a look at anti-ship cruise missile and medium-range ballistic missile components, as well as sensor turrets, that were recently seized during a U.S. Navy SEAL raid of a dhow. This materiel was bound for Iranian-backed Houthi militants in Yemen, which have their arsenals of exactly these kinds of capabilities targeted in U.S. and British strikes in the past week.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) released pictures and other information about the seized materiel, which was recovered from an unnamed dhow off the coast of Somalia on January 11. The dhow was deemed to be unsafe and was sunk, and the final "disposition" of its 14 crew members is now "being determined in accordance with international law."

U.S. Navy SEALs operating from the Expeditionary Sea Base ship USS Lewis B. Puller, with the help of helicopters and drones, conducted the complex nighttime boarding operation. Two SEALs went missing at sea during the mission and search and rescue operations to try to find them are still ongoing.
...

It was inevitable I guess, Fair winds gentleman…
Military ends rescue search for Navy SEALs lost in maritime raid on ship with Iranian weapons

WASHINGTON (AP) — The 10-day search to rescue two Navy SEALs lost in the Arabian Sea during a mission to board a ship and confiscate Iranian-made weapons has been ended and the sailors are now considered deceased, the U.S. military said Sunday.

In a statement, U.S. Central Command said the search has now been changed to a recovery effort. The names of the SEALs have not been released as family notifications continue.