Somalia Pirates - French Hostages Phone Home

Somalia - Jean-Yves Delanne, a french citizen being kept hostage by pirates in Somalia, has spoken with his daughter Alizée Delanne in Tahiti via satellite phone, telling her "Nous allons bien" - "We are well".  Alizée Delanne first learned of the trouble with her parents, who were sailing a yacht near the Gulf of Aden, when she received a call that the EPIRB (a safety device) had been triggered on the boat.  The Tahiti resident tried frantically to reach her parents via satellite telephone, to no avail.  When she finally got through to her father to ask why the alert had been triggered, his reply shocked her.  "My father tells me that he and my mother are with pirates on board, and he said that everything is going alright."

"I started to panic, but he reassured me. Basically, he told me that everything would be fine, and that the pirates were rather cool-headed,"  said Alizée Delanne to press.  Jean-Yves and his wife Bernardette Delanne are currently being kept hostage by pirates near Eyl in Somalia.  It appears that the pirates hijacked the yacht, an Amel Super Maramu called Carré d'As IV, in the Gulf of Aden, as the couple was delivering it from Australia to France. 

Jean-Yves Delanne, who is retired from the Post Office, and Bernadette, retired from the Bank of Polynesia, live in Tahiti, and are avid sailors. The couple has their own sailboat in Papeete, where Jean-Yves Delanne is often seen around the yacht club, and is well known to area boaters.  Our hearts go out to the Delanne family, and we hope for a safe and speedy release from the Somali pirates.  We'll keep you posted here at YachtPals as we receive news from France, Tahiti, and Somalia.

- by K. Hampton, exclusively for YachtPals.com

Read more about:

• Captured Yacht Decoy for Somalian Pirates?
• Piracy (all articles about piracy)
• Piracy Somalia (all articles about piracy in Somalia)
• Le Ponant Yacht - French Hostages
  
• Playa de Bakio -  Pirates Attack Boat in Somalia
• German Hostages kept by Pirates in Somalia
• Somalia Piracy Out of Control
• Pirates Kidnap French Yacht Crew (news article about the pirate attack on the yacht Carré d'As IV)