1975. Pirates attack Falck’s Guia in Panama. A thriller to be read in one breath

Welcome to the special section “GdV 5th Years.” We are introducing you, day by day, An article from the archives of the Journal of Sailing, starting in 1975. A word of advice, get in the habit of starting your day with the most exciting sailing stories-it will be like being on a boat even if you are ashore.

Pirates attack Falck’s Guia in Panama. A thriller to be read in one breath

Taken from the 1975 Journal of Sailing, Year 1 No. 1, July, pp. 12/15.

Luciano Ladavas and his companion Leo are attacked by Hungarian pirates while crossing the Panama Canal. Here comes the Panamanian army, how will it end?

Leo Rova, Luciano Ladavas’ adventure companion, sent exclusively to “Il Giornale della Vela” the account of the seizure of the “old” Guia in Panama waters. This is the only first-hand document among the many inaccuracies published by Italian and foreign newspapers

Balboa, June. Today I am celebrating my eight days of existence, and that is to say, it has been a week that Luciano and I have had the feeling that every day is an anniversary to celebrate. Without wishing to evoke the Grand-Guignol, the dirty lady in black with her big bat wings and bandolier scythe made for an interminable visit and only just stuck to us. I believe you will know about our adventure, because we talked on the phone with Giorgio Falck, to whom Luciano described the events, and some articles must have appeared in the newspapers. A new era of piracy toward recreational boats has begun. U.S. police in the Panama Canal Zone have confirmed this new crime to us. Here is the report. My chronicle.

The arrival in Cristobal

We arrive in Cristobal, a port on the Atlantic side of the U.S. portion of the Panama Canal on May 14, and here we decide that we will pass the Panama Canal on Friday, May 16. The Cristobal Yacht Club will host us during these two days, as is customary with small pleasure boats that cross the channel. The relevant authorities give us explanations about the crossing, which involves the passage of several locks: an official pilot must accompany us throughout the crossing, but we equally need three “linesmen,” that is, three people, in addition to the two of us, in order to be two on the starboard side, two on the port side, plus one at the helm, at the time of the passage of the locks, when four large lines are stretched between the boat and the two edges of the lock. According to custom, the additional crew is chosen from the other sailboats crossing the channel. Arriving in Balboa, on the Pacific coast, take the railroad back to Cristobal. This is how, with two boats crossing every other day, the necessary crew can be assembled. For us, however, it is different.

No yacht crew is available. Some young people show up friendly to help us: one day two Colombian freighter sailors at that time without a boarding contract; another day a Hungarian who speaks a little French shows up. He says he is the owner of a Dufour 34 that is in drydock in Cartagena, on Colombia’s Atlantic coast; he has been working for a few months in Cristobal doing odd jobs at the Yacht Club to pay for repairs to his boat in Colombia, as work is very rare there and especially very poorly paid. All these explanations are plausible, as indeed some people tell us they saw him in Cristobal in November alone with a Dufour. Crossing the channel is fine. We leave the Cristobal Yacht Club Friday afternoon to arrive at the Balboa Yacht Club Saturday morning, where our cosmopolitan crew disembarks, after being thanked and given some money to pay for a meal and the train ride back to Cristobal.

A seemingly quiet area

On Saturday and Sunday we are having lunch with an Italian friend who has been living in Panama City for a few months. He boasts us the region as the quietest and safest compared to neighboring Colombia, where a lot of things like robberies and other daily crimes happen. The facts to follow must belie these decidedly naive comments; conversations we had afterwards with the local police, the Panamanian and the American Canal Zone police, equally confirm that there is nothing peaceful about the country as acts of violence and crime happen daily.

Pirate attack on the Guia

Here, now, I come to the facts, but to tell you what follows, some preliminary explanation clarifying the situation was essential. During the night of Sunday the 18th to Monday the 19th we are anchored at the Balboa Yacht Club and we are sleeping; a hand rests on my mouth, I feel the coldness of a knife blade on my throat, a flashlight is pointed at my eyes. I let escape, after trying to free my mouth, a scream worthy of Callas in her glory days. Luciano wakes up and is immediately immobilized. We recognize one of the two Colombians and the Hungarian who had accompanied us on the canal crossing. The Colombian has a sharp knife and the Hungarian a gun that he points firmly at the two of us. We are in the aft cabin, which has two bunks. They make me reach Luciano’s bed, bind our hands and feet, one of the bandits rips off one of my T-shirts, shoves half of it into Luciano’s mouth and half into mine. And, in the best tradition of detective novels, they close our mouths with tape at least two or three inches high. As an added precaution, they tie us back to back.

This is without explanation. We hear them on deck removing the curtain that protects the boat from the sun. All this by the light of the flashlight, because it is a moonless night. An engine noise approaches and the two thugs re-enter. The Hungarian asks us to be quiet. Unnecessary precaution, because we are bound like mummies. Let me explain: at the Balboa Yacht Club, transportation between the boats at anchor and the club is provided by a flotilla of motor dinghies because, due to a strong tide, there is but one floating pontoon. It is a service that works very well: when you want to reach land, you whistle or shout and the dinghy-taxi arrives. This is the engine that can be heard approaching. The man in the dinghy probably mistook my shout for a call, but, seeing the silent boat with no light, he leaves after a few minutes. The Guia engine is started. The Hungarian during the channel crossing had plenty of time to inquire about startup and the amount of fuel on board.

After an hour of sailing, around 5:30, daylight comes. The two bandits take turns at the helm, gun in hand, without losing sight of each other. They remove the tape and rags from our mouths. In the morning, around eleven o’clock, the Hungarian frees me and also loosens the ropes at Luciano’s feet. He asks me to prepare some food for the two of us, I refuse, because, as you can imagine, our stomachs are quite contracted. Being now able to speak we ask what their intentions are. Throughout the adventure we speak only to the Hungarian, who seems to be the brains of the gang. He replies that their purpose is to reach a lonely place. Nothing else.

While we were still tied up, the Hungarian had rummaged through the Guia and thus found our carbine, which Channel Customs had sealed because the weapon was to remain inoperable while passing U.S. territorial waters.

We do not know what their true intentions are. Covered by the noise of the engine, in Italian, a language the two of them ignore, Luciano and I exchange a few guesses: that they are trafficking drugs, that they want to reach the Colombian coast illegally. We think they are small-time adventurers, but absolutely not murderers. I repeat that the Hungarian, after untying me and Luciano’s feet, had allowed us some freedom: for me to move between the bathroom and the kitchen; for Luciano, still with his hands tied, to go only to the bathroom (his hands were slightly free so that he could pee independently).

I then enjoy relative freedom to come and go from the rear cabin, the bathroom, and the kitchen under the pretext of looking for a glass of water, peeing, etc. Each passage allows us to look into the cockpit. We have time to see a travel bag dripping with water (we later learned that the two of them had swum to the boat with life jackets and a small makeshift raft, on which the bag in question was resting, and that the gun had been carried in a bag attached to the Hungarian’s head). From the dripping water sack they pull out something that looks to us like a panoply for making fake papers: that is, different punches, stamps, pads, pens and pencils, which are put on the deck to dry.

Will they be dangerous?

Our opinion about the dangerousness of these individuals is reinforced, but we do not attempt anything, because the bandits strive to create an atmosphere of confidence, of trust: the Hungarian tells us that they simply want to land in a quiet place and leave. We do not attempt anything to resolve the situation, because even a suspicion on their part can push them to a tragic reaction. In fact, the Hungarian never leaves the gun behind, and to convince us that it is well loaded at one point he fires two shots into the air.

We have no idea what direction the boat is taking, but Luciano and I, through the portholes, based on the position of the sun, think it is about thirteen o’clock. Luciano, at this point, plans to write some notes. He asks me to go find a pencil, I go to the kitchen to get it, and I notice that our kitchen knives are missing. Luciano writes covertly about the “Gulag Archipelago,” which he pretends to read. Suppose we are in the Las Perlas Archipelago, a group of islands about fifty miles southeast of Panama.

It is about fourteen o’clock, the Guia slows down, evidently the two are looking for a discreet anchorage. We say to each other, “Merde! It’s not them who want to land, it’s us.” Indeed, wanting to land on an island seemingly without means of communication to reach the mainland is absurd.

Our fear is increasing by the minute, but our cold blood and especially our hope never leaves us.

The boat stops and is anchored in a bay in front of the beach.

Our hope increases

We go out on deck, beg the Hungarian to tell us his intentions: “I need the inflatable Zodiac because the Colombian and I will reach the beach and leave the island by a means I know.” We tell them several times that we are willing to accompany them wherever they wish and that the money that is on board is at their disposal. Their troubles with the police do not interest us (and it is true), we wish to help them as long as there is no casualty or damage to the boat.

They seem hopeful to us, our hope increases. The Hungarian tells us that they do not want to do us any harm, they just want to land illegally.

Then Luciano also asks that we can recover the Zodiac because he had purchased it in Fort-de-France and it had cost us an arm and a leg.

The Hungarian agrees; he seems to understand our problems. He gathers his things into the bag; a maneuver that will later prove to be a travesty of departure to put us at ease, since the two never intended to leave the Guia.

In any case we stay alert: up to that point no act of sabotage has been done to immobilize the boat for a time, such as emptying the fuel reserves, cutting the halyards or discharging the batteries and so on. Then, with some hope, Luciano proposes that we go ashore with the two of them; since he was tied up, one would row, the other would keep an eye on him with the gun, and I would be bound and re-bound. Here is a program that offers them no risk. The Hungarian refuses, and decides to go ashore only with Luciano, to return for his accomplice, to reach new beach, to free Luciano who would return only with the dinghy. Strange. But we have no choice, plus we are eager to finish it.

The Zodiac is finally inflated, everything is ready for landing. The Hungarian, very slow in his gestures and apparently also in his decisions, seems to want to buy time.

Tension rises on the Guia

Tension rises and Luciano proposes that they approach the Guia on the beach. They agree. The engine is restarted. Luciano even has to help them raise the anchor, because it seems to us that they are not very skilled in maneuvering. They throw the anchor back in closer.

Luciano receives orders to go back down to the cabin. Through a small pocket mirror, Luciano can see the Hungarian as he explains to the Colombian that he wants to kill Luciano on the nearby beach (which is called Punta Matalero, which means Slaughterhouse Point. Funny isn’t it?), and to kill me on another small island.

The Hungarian knows only a few words of Spanish and communicates with his accomplice mostly in gestures. So, Luciano sees the Hungarian, the gun pointed at his temple as he points to the cabin where we are, then his finger pointed in the direction of the beach.

“He’s going to kill us both!”

Extremely explicit gestures. Luciano does not say anything to me for fear of a desperate reaction from me, but he goes out on deck under the pretext of peeing overboard. The Hungarian meanwhile is scanning the landscape to make sure it is completely deserted. At that moment the Colombian accomplice is mimicking to Luciano the gesture of seizing the Hungarian’s revolver and at the same time plunging a knife into his back, since the Hungarian has decided to kill us, but he strongly disagrees.

Luciano, still with his hands tied, asks me to get a hammer and something sharp to free him, because, he tells me, “the Hungarian will kill us both.”

I go, surreptitiously from the Hungarian, to the kitchen, find a small knife that I slip into the pocket of my jeans, get a solid hammer in the utensils cupboard; that’s when I hear a sound of a struggle on the deck. I run to see and find the Colombian clinging to the Hungarian in an attempt to disarm him and push him into the water. I take a hammer to the Hungarian’s head, but only manage to injure him without knocking him out. The Hungarian clings to the shrouds and the Colombian flies overboard, having managed to grab the gun, however.

A shot leaves from Browning: it was intended for the Hungarian, but it goes astray. I fight like an animal and always remain in possession of the hammer. The Colombian in the water, with his little chicken brain, does not think that the revolver is useless now, tries to give it to me, but the weapon falls into the water.

It is a very quick scene. I get rid of the Hungarian who takes hold of a crank, give the hammer to Luciano who, still with his hands half-bent, keeps the Hungarian at a distance by wielding the hammer, jumping with the elasticity of a spring and letting out high-pitched shouts to look as frightening as possible.

I take hold of a crank and give it to the Colombian who has meanwhile climbed back on board. I descend, miraculously find the magazine of the carbine, load it, and lurk in the bow; I stand with the tip of my nose and carbine level with the deck and check the situation. Struggling with the Hungarian, Luciano finally manages to push him against the tree. The Colombian is completely hallucinated (crank clenched in fist and arms outstretched) and is of no help to us. However, I still do not trust his reactions and keep him under the control of my carbine.

I specify that we had absolutely no intention of killing anyone … besides then the idea of having to transport a bleeding corpse. To tell the truth after all these hours of anguish what we would have liked would have been just to see the Hungarian disappear without killing him or without smashing his head with a hammer. Perhaps, if we had gotten hold of the revolver during the fight, we would have killed him, but like this, now almost cold….

So, nose and carbine level with the deck like Calamity Jane, I hold my sights on the Hungarian who is still hesitant to leave. He tells Luciano, “I want to retrieve some photographs that are in the kitchen.” Luciano picks them up and throws them to him. They are ID photos.

The Hungarian, however, still prevaricates, tries to retrieve his accomplice, but to no avail. I, terribly nervous, shout to the Colombian to detach the Zodiac to hasten the Hungarian’s disappearance. Indeed, the Hungarian tosses his bag into the dinghy, which recedes a bit, then finally dives in and reaches the Zodiac.

Luciano turns to the Colombian and asks him if we can help him because, “merde!” he saved our lives. The Colombian asks us to take him to Balboa. He is trembling with fear. Luciano explains to him that it is not our intention to hand him over to the police, but that to the police in Balboa we will have to tell them the whole truth, so that they can arrest the Hungarian as soon as possible, I assure him that we will allow him the opportunity to land discreetly and disappear, although this seems difficult for him.

This poor devil, sweating with fear, asks me for a whiskey to cheer himself up. I am still so excited that I keep the carbine handy (he has never seen it); I hurry to make him a small rum-pineapple-juice cocktail and substantial dose of sleeping pill. We want a “relaxing” return.

Luciano, meanwhile, tries to find his way back, we have no maps and the place is full of rocks and cliffs. But, thanks to his catlike eyes and seamanship, after a few hours we see the lighthouses of the coast.

The happy ending

At 5 a.m., we dock at the floating pontoon of the Balboa Yacht Club. An hour earlier we had awakened the Colombian who was sleeping like an angel. We persuade him to turn himself in to the police, plus we explain that, with our testimony on his behalf, he would have significant mitigating circumstances. He convinces himself.

Panamanian and U.S. policemen arrive at the Yacht Club along with a cloud of journalists who have arisen from nowhere. It is only by seeing this crowd that we realize the seriousness of the case. The Colombian is arrested on U.S. soil. The general-in-chief of the Panamanian Army, the government’s gray eminence, is alerted by a journalist and immediately gives the order for a helicopter to fly over the Las Perlas archipelago, Panamanian territory. This abnormal police efficiency is due to the tense situation between the U.S. Canal Zone territory and the Republic of Panama.

Each wants to do better than the other. Eventually this incredible deployment of forces, lookouts, helicopters with sharpshooters, will prove to be of ‘extraordinary effectiveness, and after a few hours the Hungarian is captured. He had found refuge on a local fishermen’s boat, told the captain that he had been shipwrecked for three days. The boat crew had picked up the Hungarian, who wanted to reach Panama, clandestinely board some freighter and leave the country. But the jerk had left the bloated Zodiac on the boat’s deck, and the helicopter had had no trouble finding him.

The Panamanian press has been very vocal about this, polemically evoking U.S. military bases along the canal and at the same time the lack of safety for the poor civilian crossing the canal.

The Panama police at this point decide to turn the Hungarian over to the Americans. The investigation begins immediately. The two are blamed for kidnapping and armed robbery. A first hearing, with judges and defense attorneys (chosen ex officio, of course), takes place because the court wants to hear our testimony: the investigation is not over (the Hungarian, according to Interpol information, allegedly stole the Dufour in France and possibly even killed three other people) and we have no intention of staying here until the trial is over.

Tomorrow, we go with a police lookout and divers to retrieve the gun. Then we will continue our journey

Leo Rova

• Check out all the articles from the GdV archive in this section