Incidents · piracy

M/V towing barge, 12 persons on board, hijacked in 03-12N 104-01E at 051800Z feb

South China Sea · HYDROPAC 253/10

What this record establishes

Archived notice · 2010-02-10 21:18Z

This notice comes from the historical archive. Its archived status does not establish when or how the reported situation ended.

Source and dates
NGA MSI broadcast-warn JSON (archive, frozen 2024-05) · NAVAREA XI 74/10 090331Z FEB 10.. Issued 2010-02-09 04:10Z. First collected 2026-08-17 13:38Z; last seen in collection 2026-08-17 15:46Z. Collection dates record ingestion, not a new incident or a fresh field observation.
Location covered
South China Sea. The parsed report position is 3.200, 104.017. It is a position in the source message, not a live location. Check the original wording for limits and qualifications.

Related notices and cancellation links

These messages are connected by recorded cancellation references. The links establish relationships between notices; they do not by themselves confirm a single object, a continuous track, or recovery.

  1. HYDROPAC 253/10 · this notice2010-02-09 · Archived notice
  2. HYDROPAC 266/102010-02-10 · Archived notice
Compare all 2 notices, changes and original texts →

Current notices and reporting history in the South China Sea →

issued
2010-02-09 04:10Z
status
Archived notice
authority
NAVAREA XI 74/10 090331Z FEB 10.
NAVAREA
NAVAREA XI · named as the source of this relay
sea
South China Sea
position
3.200, 104.017
source
NGA MSI broadcast-warn JSON (archive, frozen 2024-05) · first seen 2026-08-17 13:38Z

Original warning text

SOUTH CHINA SEA.
PIRACY.
1. M/V TOWING BARGE, 12 PERSONS ON BOARD,
   HIJACKED IN 03-12N 104-01E AT 051800Z FEB.
   CAUTION ADVISED.
2. CANCEL THIS MSG 23 FEB.

Reading this warning

Piracy and armed robbery
Attacks and attempted boardings of ships, and suspicious approaches by small craft.
Tow / towing
A vessel towing another vessel, a barge or a structure — slow, hard to manoeuvre, and with a long line between.
Persons on board (POB)
The number of people reported aboard a vessel in distress, overdue or missing.
Position (degrees and minutes)
How warnings write positions: degrees, a hyphen, then minutes, with N/S and E/W — 49-40.8N 003-43.8W.
Date-time group (DTG)
A compact UTC timestamp — day, hour and minute followed by Z — such as 201500Z for the 20th at 15:00 UTC.
CANCEL THIS MSG
The warning's own expiry: a line telling the reader when the message cancels itself.

All warning terms →

Collected reports in this area · distress & casualty cases (archived)

372 within 180 nm since 1999 · 0 in the last 12 months · 0 listed in force now

99
00
05
10
15
20
24

Counts include repeat notices about the same situation. NGA archive coverage ends 2024-05; live collection began 2026-08-17. The period between them is incomplete. An empty year is not evidence that no hazards occurred.

Month of issue in the collected archive

J
F
M
A
M
J
J
A
S
O
N
D

All available years combined. Uneven collection and repeat bulletins affect these counts; this chart does not measure the seasonality or probability of incidents.

Nearby notices listed in force · within 120 nm

Worldwide in the collected sources

0 distress & casualty cases (archived) listed in force · see all

Record snapshot 2026-10-03 20:29Z; source collection times vary.

Incidents

Search-and-rescue broadcasts, published only once a case has been closed for 30 days: groundings, sinkings, capsizes, fires, man overboard, overdue vessels. Nothing here is live. All current distress & casualty cases (archived) →

Not for navigation. This is a re-rendering of an official navigational warning for awareness; mariners must use official NAVAREA broadcasts and their national MSI service.