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Early in January 2009, a Saudi oil Tanker that had been hijacked and detained by pirates for many months was bailed out with a ransom to the tune of $3,000,000. It is reported that the boat they were traveling in was subjected to fire attack from a rival group of pirates and forced to capsize. 5 pirates drowned just after they had shared the spoils of the ransom. The body of one the pirates was washed ashore by the current with $153,000 in cash tied up in a plastic bag wrapped in his breast pocket. This finding sent many Somalis into the sea, looking for the four other men who were also believed to have drowned.

Piracy along the Somali section of the East African coast has become a lucrative business where young Somali gunmen are becoming stinky rich in recent times. It is often a well coordinated system master minded by war lords who conscript young men hardened by the many years of war to attack the ship that ply the Indian Ocean waters.

The conscripts are promised well in advance, what they will get, and the Masterminds finance the entire operation of the pirates day and night, including supplying them with arms, transport and food. It is this initial investment that later pays off when a ship is successfully attacked and seized by the pirates.

 Millions of dollars change hands when pirates succeed in their operations. But success also comes along with serious internal strives and intrigue. Because Pirates are administered in a strict hierarchy, sometimes-internal fractures erupt and it becomes very difficult to tell a true friend from an enemy within the ranks of the pirates themselves. As a result, killings at the point of sharing the spoils are not so uncommon.