Page 75 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo II

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ActA
The Lido II-incident
On 1 May 1994, the SHARP GUARD units became involved in the most serious attempt
to circumvent the embargo when a Maltese tanker tried to violate the embargo.
At 06:00 hours, the 45,000 ton tanker Lido II and its primarily Russian crew entered the
Adriatic Sea and stated that it was on its way to Durres in Albania. However, the SHARP
GUARD headquarters soon established that on 28 – 29 April the ship had reported that
it was on the way to Rijeka in Croatia. This meant that the ship’s actual destination was
unclear. At 06:15 hours, the authorities in Durres informed the SHARP GUARD head-
quarters that they were not expecting the Lido II. Consequently, the ship was reclassified
to “suspect vessel” and US cruiser Philippine Sea set a course for the ship’s position.
At 06:24 hours, the Lido II sent out a mayday signal and claimed that water was entering
its engine room. The captain of the Lido II announced that his intention was to beach
the ship on the Albanian coast as soon as possible to avoid an environmental disaster.
The ship did not, however, head for the Albanian coast but instead steered directly for
Montenegro and increased its speed to 14-15 knots.
At the same time, two Yugoslavian surface battle groups were operating in the area: to
the north, a Koni class frigate and a Koncar class missile boat, and to the south, a Kotor
class frigate and two other missile boats. When the Lido II started sending out mayday
signals, the southern group headed towards the tanker, going approx. 25-30 knots. They
soon moved out of Yugoslavian territorial waters which was unprecedented. At the same
time, the SHARP GUARD units could hear the radio communication between the Lido
II and the Yugoslavian warships.
British frigate Chatham and Dutch frigate Van Kinsbergen were ordered to intercept the
Lido II as soon as possible and the tanker was repeatedly ordered to turn away and slow
down. The captain of the Lido refused, claiming that any changes to course or speed
would increase the risk of the ship sinking.
While US cruiser Philippine Sea headed towards the Maltese tanker, the US ship asked
for permission to use “disabling fire” against the Lido II if it did not follow the order
to stop. The request was granted. Immediately afterwards, the captain of the US cruiser
passed the job on to Dutch frigate Van Kinsberger which was closer to the Lido II. The
problem was then, however, that in the US Navy, “disabling fire” means firing at the
engine room while in the Dutch navy it means firing at the ship’s bridge – where the risk
of killing and wounding crewmembers is considerably higher.
Luckily, it did not become necessary to open fire on the Lido II, but the incident showed
the lack of – and need for - common NATO force guidelines.
At 07:15 hours, a helicopter from Van Kinsbergen transferred a Dutch boarding team
to the Lido II, and five minutes later the boarding team had the tanker under control and
changed its heading to southwest. Shortly after, a damage control team was transferred
from the Chatham and the flooding was quickly stopped. It turned out that the flooding
problem primarily was the result of the tanker’s crew having configured a pump to pump
water into the engine room.