To be armed when cruising?

[northbay]

Hello list,
Troubling news out of Guatemala with the death of a 66
year old cruiser and assult of his 67 year old wife while both
onboard.

I for one support the idea of being armed. Other ideas for
securing one's boat must be considered. What say you all?

Bob s/v Journey

[Valiente]

Try the search function, Bub. I'm sure someone has commented on this topic at some point in the past.

Me, I don't patronize crappy little narcorepublics and spread deck-coloured tacks around, a la Slocum. YMMV.

[Johnrb]

Here is the link to the earlier discussion:

http://www.sailnet.com/forums/genera...guatemala.html

[Perithead]

Well, if everyone is on the water legally then everyone is already armed.

If someone pointed a flare gun at me I think I would stop what I was doing.

So, a flare gun would be good protection. If you want something more then just get yourself a small spear gun with a pistol grip. That would scare me too.

[imagine2frolic]

You ever watch Dead Calm? I was once being followed by a Panga in Mexico. They kept coming closer, and closer. I tried to communicate with them, but no reply. When I pulled out the flare gun they made an abrupt turn away, and kept going!

[Cruisingdad]

Originally Posted by imagine2frolic

You ever watch Dead Calm? I was once being followed by a Panga in Mexico. They kept coming closer, and closer. I tried to communicate with them, but no reply. When I pulled out the flare gun they made an abrupt turn away, and kept going!

Flare gun??? Are you crazy?!? WHo needs a flare gun? What you need is this ferocious animal for protection:



Oh, no... crap! Not that pic. Sorry. Wrong one. Here is is... the MAN EATER!!!



Now, aren't you scared?? Eh??

- CD

[imagine2frolic]

I'll stick with the flare gun. Those vicious BEASTS are too damned cute to toss at a panga 20 yards away

[magnusmurphy]

If you are referring to the incident in the Rio Dulce, there is a long discussion on the Seven Seas Cruising Association's bulletin board. This incident was part of a rash of boat boardings by a drug gang. The government sent a whole lot of army troops and most of the implicated people were captured and in fact, most were killed in the ensuing battles. This particular incident seems to have been resolved.

Whether having guns on board would have helped against heavily armed gansters is debatable. It might have triggered early and heavy shooting from them. Fiberglass is not bulletproof.

M Murphy

[sailingdog]

What, you didn't order a couple extra layers of kevlar for your boat???

Originally Posted by magnusmurphy

If you are referring to the incident in the Rio Dulce, there is a long discussion on the Seven Seas Cruising Association's bulletin board. This incident was part of a rash of boat boardings by a drug gang. The government sent a whole lot of army troops and most of the implicated people were captured and in fact, most were killed in the ensuing battles. This particular incident seems to have been resolved.

Whether having guns on board would have helped against heavily armed gansters is debatable. It might have triggered early and heavy shooting from them. Fiberglass is not bulletproof.

M Murphy

[MMurphy]

Oops, damn...I knew I forgot something...

Anyway, one can only hope one never gets into a situation like that - it's alltogether bad, whatever weapons you have on board and the eventual outcome uncertain. At least this particular case was taken very seriously by the country in question's authorities (apparently even some cabinet minister went to talk to cruisers), which is not what one can apparently say about what's going on in Venezuela

M Murphy

I wanted to paste a link to the discussion here but sailnet refused, stating I only have 5 posts. Funny, I've been posting here for more than five years! Anyway, Look for "Rio Dulce" under "destinations" on the SSCA website bulletin board.