When travelling in the waters surrounding Singapore, sailors might want to start watching out for the Jolly Roger.

That's because Singapore's straits have seen a recent spate of pirate attacks, with two coming on Saturday (Jan. 18).

According to the Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combating Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia Information Sharing Centre (ReCAAP ISC), a total of three incidents have been reported since the start of January 2020, with another eight happening in December last year.

In fact, 2019 was a bumper year for pirates in the Singapore Strait with 31 incidents reported, a stark contrast to the seven incidents reported in 2018.

Seven pirates in sampans

In one of the incidents over the weekend, seven pirates boarded a barge, LKH 2882, that was being towed by a tugboat called Kim Hock Tug 9 at about 11:30am.

The gang made a getaway in two or three sampans, after they saw another tugboat approaching them.

No confrontation between the pirates and crew occurred however several pieces of scrap metal were stolen.

A few hours later at 3:51pm, seven pirates once again boarded LKH 2882. It is unsure if these were the same seven pirates from the earlier incident.

This prompted two Singapore Police Coast Guard boats to be dispatched.

The seven perpetrators fled upon seeing the boats.

Once again several pieces of scrap metal were stolen.

Wielding knives

According to the ReCAAP ISC, a previous incident that occurred on Christmas day (Dec. 25) last year involved six pirates, who were spotted in the engine room of British tanker the Stena Immortal.

The ship's alarm system was activated, and the six unarmed intruders fled empty-handed in a small boat without any confrontation.

Two incidents two days prior on Dec. 23, 2019, saw knife-wielding pirates board ships and tie-up crew members.

Both incidents saw the pirates flee empty-handed when each ship's alarm system was activated.

In an incident alert issued on Jan. 19, ReCAAP ISC expressed their concerns with the "continued occurrence of incidents in the Singapore Strait, and the persistence of the perpetrators in their attempts to board ships".

"All ships are strongly advised to exercise utmost vigilance, adopt extra precautionary measures and report all incidents immediately to the nearest coastal State."

Top image from TheLastBrunnenG via Wikicommons and Shipspotting.com