Originally Posted by
Hangarless
I would suggest that the F18 was not out for a little bit of target practice and that there is a reason that they stopped that particular ship.
All shipping in the region, regardless of the communication channel they are using at any given time, must also monitor channel 16 (I posted the updated notices to seafarers above in the thread)
Channel 16 is being used by the USN for hailing purposes. If, by chance, Lianstar was not monitoring the channel and she was hailed by the USN wishing to know where she was going, what she was carrying etc, the USN will demand that she stops. If still no response, an aircraft will be launched from a principle ship to make contact - incase of radio failure or other issues that meant the ship was unable to communicate. If that does not raise a response they will open fire on the ship to disable it....either by shooting the rudder off (which has been done at least 4 times previously) or they will shoot the funnel off (again this has been done at least 3 times previously). On one occasion a surface ship opened fire on a non-responsive ship that ended up gaining holes shot into its engineroom.
It is not target practice at all. It is standard procedure to stop a ship that is not responding to being hailed and not responding to a request to heave to.