Three British adventurers on 500km sailing race taken hostage by knife-wielding pirates off the coast of Tanzania
The trio was tied up and threatened with machetes and explosives
THREE Brits have spoken of their terror at being held hostage at knifepoint by pirates and having almost all of their belongings stolen while sailing off the coast of Tanzania.
The trio from the Isle of Man were taking part in the Ngalawa Cup racing event near Zanzibar earlier this month when they were captured by a gang of seven men.
Although Anthony has experience in sailing at a high level from university, none of the trio had ever embarked on such a trip before.
Speaking to The Sun Online, Chris, 29, said: “We found this website and found this sailing event which was a race in a local fishing boat about 6m long like a carved out tree trunk with rudders – it’s not really designed for what we were doing with it and that sounded fun.
“We had a couple of days training and then set off on the race.
"We were doing quite well, we were in second position with only a couple of Swedes ahead of us and they were proper adventure types not like us who were just three guys from an office.”
On the third day of their trip however while they were trying to make a 40m open water crossing, disaster struck as they were battered by giant waves too big for their tiny boat and began to sink.
Chris added: “It was the Titanic basically, we went straight down, the boat broke apart and we had to call for emergency assistance and wait in the water for about three and a half hours to be rescued.
“We eventually got it to shore and there was a hold on the race the next day anyway so we tried to repair it.”
It was while they were waiting on the small island of Sinda near Dar es Salaam, home only to a national park, on July 12 that the gang of fisherman captured them – armed with knives, machetes and even sticks of dynamite.
The 29-year-old accountant from Douglas said: “We managed to persuade a local fisherman to go back to the mainland to get us some parts.
"For a few hours we were sat there so we set up camp to get out of the sun, about 1pm in the afternoon Anthony and Taz were sat in one of the tents and I was sat on some trees when four guys came down towards us asking for water.
“The next thing I knew there was a crash behind me and some more guys came down, one of them had his arm around my chest and a serrated fisherman’s knife at my throat.
“It took us completely by surprise and we couldn’t defend ourselves, they dragged us off into woods behind where we set up camp and demanded money.
“They tied us all up to each other with our hands behind our backs and took all our clothes, bank cards, electronics, iPhones, cameras, the works.
“At first we didn’t think they were really going to do anything but when they took us into the woods and tied us up we thought; ‘there is only one reason they’re doing this’.
“It got to a point where when they took Taz away on his own we thought; ‘we have to do something’.
“Taz can speak Urdu and a couple of words in Swahili but not much. We think they were trying to speak to us in Swahili and when we couldn’t understand them they were getting irate with us, swinging the machetes around from shoulder to the ground.”
The trio, who used to work together at an accountancy firm on the Isle of Man, each had about £500 in cash stolen and Chris was left with just the clothes he had on his back, plus one spare t-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts.
The only warning they received before embarking on the nine-day race was that opportunistic thieves might strike if they left belongings outside their tents but said they didn’t have any concerns about going beforehand as the area is marketed as a tourist destination.
Luckily for the group of friends the gang was spooked by a tourist boat landing on the island and after about an hour of being tied up they managed to free themselves and run for help.
After making a call to the organisers to tell them what happened they were taken by the boat back to the Kipepeo Beach Resort hotel on the mainland and were able to tell police about their ordeal.
Chris added: "All of the tourists were shocked, the guard allowed us to use his phone to call the organisers to tell them we were safe. We each had individual GPS trackers in case we fell into the water and we had told them we were staying put for the day so eventually they would have twigged that we were moving."
The following day the trio decided not to continue with the race with Taz going to stay with family in the nearby city of Dar es Salaam, while Chris and Anthony planned to head home.
Chris said: "It took a good day or so to file the police report and we were 50/50 about whether we were going to carry on with the race. I was keen, Taz wasn’t bothered and Anthony just wanted to get home which was understandable."
Incredibly, their nightmare still hadn't come to an end as when the penniless pair contacted Emirates to change the date of their trip home, as they weren't due to fly back until the Sunday, they were told they had to pay £150 each - despite explaining what they'd been through and that they had no cash.
Fortunately the thieves had missed a credit card tucked away in one of their passports and they were able to charge the fee to that but Chris remains unimpressed by the airline's customer service.
Emirates has been contacted for comment.
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