The latest cruise luxury? Armed marines aboard

AN ELITE squad of armed former Royal Marines secretly joined a luxury cruise to protect passengers from pirates.

The crack team boarded the Queen Mary 2 as it sailed through the Gulf of Aden, dubbed Pirate Alley because of the number of Somali outlaws there.

Few of the liner’s 2,600 passengers were aware of the plain-clothes armed unit mingling with them.

Water cannon were also fixed on deck to repel any attackers and the gunwales were fitted with sonic weapons capable of causing permanent hearing damage at close range.

Although some measures were taken in secret, a serving Marines Colonel also boarded the vessel to reassure passengers on security.

As the ship travelled at full speed for six days between Dubai and the Jordanian Red Sea resort of Aqaba, all but essential deck lights were kept switched off at night and passengers were urged not to illuminate their balconies.

Sections of deck were closed at night with notices warning: ‘Please do not distract the watch-keepers. They are part of our security precautions.’

Captain Peter Philpott also wrote to passengers: ‘In the unlikely event of a pirate attack, everyone should move to the inside of the ship, away from decks or windows. If your stateroom has a window or balcony, you should move to the corridor immediately outside to sit on either a chair or on the floor.’

He said the QM2 would be ‘under the protection of an international task force assigned by a UN mandate to protect merchant ships from a pirate attack’.

It is understood the security team’s weapons were offloaded to a small, unmarked boat before the liner arrived at Aqaba – presumably to avoid security problems with the Jordanian authorities.

QM2 owner Cunard said the precautions were ‘standard practice’ in certain areas.