'No, no, what I mean is that the hijackers will be defeated before then. I cannot reveal any more, and I would be obliged if you do not repeat anything that is discussed in this meeting, because it would be counterproductive to the safety of the passengers."
More questions came from the non-execs, because the rest of the meeting had been present on the previous occasion.
"I am afraid that I must finish this board meeting shortly. We have called a media meeting, because, obviously, we must be transparent about what is going on, and we intend to meet the media on a daily basis, to update them. So unless there is anything else, I declare the meeting closed. We will reconvene to update you as necessary, and you can always speak to Jon here."
The directors began to file out, talking between themselves. Jon went up to the chairman. "I got my secretary in to organize the press meeting. There will be about twenty here, television and the dailies. Tomorrow, I expect that the foreign correspondents will expect to attend."
"Don't let it get too big, Jon. Make it by invitation only, and include the news agencies, then they can disseminate the news down. All the British nationals, and the Beeb will need to be here, of course, and the other English TV channels."
Jon agreed, and went back to his own office to finalise what he would say.
The chairman had a few minutes before the next meeting. He decided he would phone the captain now, instead, or as well as after the meeting. Thompson had left a note with a telephone number on it. Cecil dialled the number himself, and heard the connecting clicks as it was routed through the GPS channel.
"Hello, is that Geoffrey? How's it going?"
"Well, we are busy making plans, at the moment. Shall I update you?"
"Yes please, we've got a press meeting this afternoon, I could do to hear the latest."
"Well, briefly," said the captain, who sounded very upbeat, "The weapons apparently came on board at Malaga, there was a cock-up that favoured the terrorists, because the delivery was made as soon as we docked, instead of the next morning. Again we were too far ahead of ourselves. We raided the terrorists' cabins whilst the goods were still in transit aboard the ship."
The captain went on to describe the tannoy announcement of the hijack, the dispatch of the security men, and brought Cecil completely up to date.
"Thank you, Geoffrey for that. I am at the office all over the weekend, sleeping over in London. So we must obviously keep in touch."
The chairman walked into the media meeting just before it started. There were a lot of people milling about; all admitted on presentation of their press cards.
Jon stood at the end of the room, the chairman beside him. Jon had a gavel in his hand and banged it on the boardroom table. The chairman winced to himself. The table was an expensive heirloom, dating back to the days of sail.
"Ladies and gentlemen can I have your attention. One of our cruise ships, the Helena, was hi-jacked at nine thirty this morning. There are, we think twelve hijackers, who booked on the cruise. The ship is carrying five hundred passengers, and four hundred crew. It is at present between Malaga and Naples. There are no reports of injuries or death. Our chairman Mr Rhodes, has just been on the telephone with the captain, and probably has some up to date news. Please delay your questions until you have heard him speak."
Jon gestured to Cecil, who stepped forward. "Indeed I have just finished my telephone call with the captain, who reports no injuries on board. The hijackers have instigated armed patrols of the vessel, and there is an armed guard on the bridge. They insisted that the vessel was stopped, so it is lying off the main shipping lanes. A container ship is standing by about four miles distant, in case it has to pick up passengers, or go to their aid. The terrorists loaded our security men into the ship's tender. They were picked up by the container ship. There was one injury."
"As regards ransom, they are looking for twenty million pounds sterling. A deadline of Tuesday has been set. If you have any questions, Jon or myself will try to answer them."
A forest of hands went up. Jon pointed to one person. "Smith, The Times. Did this come as unexpected, or was a warning given?"
Jon looked at the chairman, who answered. "We knew it was a possibility. There is an MI5 man on board."
More hands. "Daily Mirror. So you let the passengers sail into danger?"
"Not so. The ship had set sail, when MI5 revealed that there was at least one terrorist aboard. We knew, at that point that they had no weapons on the ship. Our security is very, very, tight. The MI5 man had missed the boat, so to speak, and flew out to join it at the first port of call, which was Vigo."
"Daily Express: have you made plans to regain control of the ship?"
"No comment, other than to say we are speaking to the UK government on a daily basis."
"Sunday Telegraph: is there sufficient food and water aboard? And are the passengers being treated well by the terrorists?"
"The ship had just been victualed at its last port which was Malaga. The passengers are not being molested at the moment. The hijackers are merely making armed patrols, so there is no panic by the passengers, as far as I have been informed by the captain. I might mention that the captain is one of the best, employed by the company for twenty years. It was to be his last cruise before retirement."
"How far is the ship from the nearest port?"
The chairman turned to Jon, who shook his head. "Well, you can work it out for yourself. It left port last night from Malaga, and cruises at twenty knots. It was hijacked at nine-thirty this morning. Maybe two hundred and fifty miles from Malaga in an easterly direction."
Jon said, "I have put some press information on the table here. There are leaflets containing full details of the Helena, dimensions, and other technical information. I printed some photographs of the ship, these are for you. By tomorrow's press call, which will be at the same time, I will have bios of the senior staff on the ship. I will also be able to let you have a passenger list."
"ITV: we have a camera crew in the street outside, will the chairman be prepared to do an interview in front of the building?"
The chairman nodded. "Immediately after this meeting."
"The Times: could you tell me if you have any well-known people on the passenger list?"
Jon said, "You will be able to check that out when you get the list tomorrow. There are two professors who are lecturers on board. I can let you have the names tomorrow. We also have a water colour artist, who is giving lesson on board. He is John McBride. You've heard of him?" Several people nodded and scribbled his name in their pads.
"Finally," said Jon, "my chairman has advised me to limit tomorrow's meeting to twenty media people. And that will have to include two agency people, for foreign media. You can either all take pot luck, and fight for admission, or better still, organize places on a sharing basis. So, until tomorrow at the same time."
The chairman was joined by the ITV representative, and taken downstairs to the street outside the building. The big TV transmitter van was parked a few yards up the street, out of frame. The camera was on the further side of the street.
The ITV man who had brought Cecil down, said, "We just finished the opening shots of your offices. We are going to zoom in to our reporter, who will do the intro, about two minutes of speech, and then will turn to you, you need to be on her left, just here, about three feet from her. And when the camera pans across to you, it will be the first our viewers see of you. You get the idea?"
"It seems simple enough." Cecil was now feeling as though he was being treated like a schoolboy. He was not a newcomer to television interviews. He prided himself on coming over rather well, fluent and at ease.
"Okay, we are starting now. He gave a signal to the interviewer, whose hair was being ruffled by the wind. She put up her hand to smooth it down, gave a large smile at the camera, and went straight into her role, an inveterate pro.
"I'm outside the head office of Sun Cruises plc, here in west London, where it has just been announced t
hat the cruise liner Helena, has been hijacked in the Mediterranean. The chairman of the Line, Mr Rhodes is with me." Cecil saw the camera pan towards him and he looked at the interviewer intently. She continued. "This must be a fraught time for you Mr Rhodes."
"Indeed it is. The hijack only occurred at nine thirty this morning, and since then we have held a director's meeting, and of course, held a media meeting. I have spoken to the captain twice today by GPS phone. I have also spoken to the hijack representative, a Keith Bourne, of the WCL."
"He would be the leader of the White Christian League, that has burned down at least one mosque?"
Someone had already done some homework.
"Indeed, the same one. He and colleagues, booked on to the cruise under false passports. Just as the ship sailed one of our staff noticed his name on the list, and immediately contacted MI5. He has demanded twenty million pounds, initially within twenty-four hours. But under pressure from us, the deadline is extended until Tuesday. No passengers have been harmed, and apart from armed patrols by the hijackers, shipboard life goes on at normal."
"Is there an emergency number that relatives can phone?"
The chairman thought on his feet. "That will be established within the next few hours, as soon as we can get staff in to the office. Although, of course, all the passengers are well at the moment." He saw the camera pan back to the reporter, and relaxed. Could have been worse.
"This is Julie Walker, speaking from west London, returning you to the studio."
She gave the microphone to a television crewman, and used both hands to brush back her hair. She held her hand out to Cecil, said she would probably see him in the near future and congratulated him for being word perfect, and not needing any retakes.
The chairman went back up the steps, and into the building. He saw Thompson preparing to latch the door. "Hang on a moment, is Mark Spalding still in the building?"
"He's in his office."
"What's his extension number?" said the chairman.
"I'll get him for you," said Thompson. He picked up the phone from the reception desk, dialled, and handed the handset to Cecil.
"Mark," said the chairman. "I'm phoning from the lobby. I've just done an interview and I was asked about a phone line for concerned passenger relatives. I said it would be set up in a few hours. Could you get some of your staff in to cope with it? Train them what to say – passengers have not been harmed, arm them with passenger lists. Tell the staff it is double time over the weekend, meals paid for. Can you do that for me?"
"Sure, I'll start now, and I'll contact IT and get a specific number for the phones."
"Many thanks, Mark. I'm leaving now, but I'm in London, and on my mobile."
Chapter 33
Cecil got a cab to his club. His first job was to ask the concierge to let him have a copy of all the Sunday papers in the morning, delivered to his room. The second thing he did was go into the bar for a large whisky. He read The Times and had another drink, before going up to his room. He switched the television to the BBC news channel. The hijack was lead news. Already they had got hold of experts, one from the SAS regiment, the other from another cruise line. Cheeky that, he thought, getting the competition to say it wouldn't happen to them.
The next morning when he opened his door there was a pile of newspapers on the carpet. He dragged them in to his room, and retired to bed to look through a few.
The Mail on Sunday headline read: Marooned: Cruise ship hijack. The others followed in similar style. The Sunday Express wondered what the government was going to do about this 'outrage.'
Cecil took a few sections of the Sunday Times downstairs to read over breakfast. He saw that they had dug out the story of the Achille Lauro hijack which was way back thirty years ago. The recent and ongoing capture of ships off Somalia, was piracy, not hijack, although the media sometimes wrongly refer to it as hijacking. Hijacking is when the attackers are already aboard as passengers, and everyone knows what piracy is. (Maybe apart from the media.)
All the papers had made good use of the details of the Helena, and most had printed plans of all the decks. One or two had managed to dig out facts on the captain's career, maybe from the internet.
The Sunday Times had a small article on the front page, and a two page spread on the hijacking inside. The Achille Lauro story was in a large panel, adjacent to the Helena story. Cecil knew the story, but it had been a few years since he had heard the story, so, over his coffee, he read the Sunday Times version. The ship was named after the owner, an Italian business man. It had been called the most unlucky ship. The keel was laid in 1939, but it was not completed until late in the second world war. It suffered an onboard explosion in 1965, caught fire in 1972, collided with a cargo ship in 1975, and caught fire again in 1981.
In the autumn of 1985, it was steaming in the Med with, reportedly 400 passengers and crew. There were members of the Palestine Liberation Force aboard. The ship was to call at Ashdod, an Israeli port, where they were going to fire on Israeli soldiers, it was later reported. After cruising around the Med looking for a port that would allow them to dock, they arrived back in Egypt, at Port Said. The rebels had slain an old man in a wheelchair, and thrown both the body and the wheelchair off the ship, which horrified the civilized world. Reporters at the dock side in Port Said, reported that the side of the ship was still smeared with the blood of the old man they had shot.
After much negotiation, the Egyptians let the four rebels off the ship, in return for the release of the passengers. Eventually the rebels obtained a flight to Tunisia on an Egyptian plane, but the plane was intercepted by US fighter planes, and forced to land at a UN airbase in Sicily. Italian Carabinieri arrested the rebels, who were imprisoned in Italian jails.
In 1994, the ship finally caught fire yet again, and sank.
Cecil folded the paper, thinking it was unfair comparing this hulk of a ship with the Helena, bang up to date, and less than ten years old. But that was the media.
The chairman spent a lazy Sunday morning reading the rest of the newspapers, and remembered to phone his wife, something he had not done the previous evening. His wife told him she had seen him do the interview on ITV, and that she thought he had done it well. "Nobody but me would have realised that having a dedicated phone line was something you hadn't thought about earlier.
"It was not a matter of hardheartedness, it was just that things were moving at breakneck speed." He thought he would be home on Tuesday at the latest, depending how the hijack went.
After an early lunch at the club he walked to the offices. He found that Mark had already got the special phone line running and manned by the staff. There were four of them, but they were not overwhelmed by calls. With the present rate of calls, Mark explained, there were no calls waiting, all incoming calls being immediately handled. He would have time to attend the press meeting, and could answer queries on the special phone line. Jon, too was in the offices, and was running off photocopies of the passenger lists, and a communiqué that he had written that morning. Cecil got a copy of the passenger list from Jon, and sat at his desk to peruse it. He could not see any famous names on it. The infamous name was Keith Bourne.
Chapter 34
Bourne arrived back on deck 5 in a bad temper. He grabbed Kevin who was in the lobby, trying to crack the computer programmes and marched him into the bar. He led him to a table that looked out of the large windows at the smooth sea, the ripples sparkling in the sun. The ship sat motionless. This deck was quiet, the passengers keeping out of the way of the hijackers. Afraid for their lives and hoping their holiday could go on unmolested, the hijackers somebody else's problem.
"We are going to have trouble with that captain," said Bourne looking at Kevin. "He gives the impression that he treats the whole hijacking as a game, doesn't take me seriously. Perhaps we ought to kill one of the officers, teach him we are serious."
"That would just piss him off," said Kevin, "He'll make things even more difficult, don't you think
?"
Bourne sighed. "Maybe. We said Tuesday, we'd start killing the passengers, that's what I told him, gave him an ultimatum."
"That's three days! How are you going to keep our troops amused in the meantime?"
"Well, they've got to patrol the ship, in shifts."
"That won't keep them out of mischief, you ought to arrange something for them to do apart from that. Otherwise they will get up to something bad, maybe start shooting people."
"That is exactly what we are going to do," said Bourne.
"You don't want them to jump the gun." Kevin realised what he had just said, and laughed, then seeing Bourne's sneer, coughed and kept quiet.
"We could have games, a shooting competition, with prizes."
"Not if we shot each other. We don't know how good they are."
Bourne was getting excited now. "No, we chuck lifebelts in the sea, line up at the rails, a point for every hit."
"Hey, that is good. And we could have a party meal altogether, push the tables together. A meal every night, special, with good food."
"We'll talk to the others, see what they can come up with," said Bourne, standing up from the table, his depression lifting.
Audrey came into the bar, looking for Bourne.
"I've pinned the patrol rotas over there," she pointed to the wall adjacent to the bar counter. There was no service. If you wanted a drink, you had to ring a hand bell on the counter. Perhaps, thought Bourne you could just help yourself. That would be dangerous for some of his colleagues, they would get out of their minds on drink given the chance. He would make sure not to mention it to anybody. Just keep on ringing the bell.
"Audrey, we're thinking of introducing some games, to keep the troops happy. There's three days before we start killing the passengers." He thought a moment, and added, "unless they pay up before."
"If I were them, I would hang on. Try to negotiate a later deadline."
"There won't be a later deadline. Tuesday is final. The killing starts then."
Cruise the Storm Page 13
