No Easy Day: The Firsthand Account of the Mission That Killed Osama Bin Laden

CHAPTER 6 Maersk Alabama

The only thing Phil loved more than a good prank was parachuting. As my team leader, Phil had a passion that drove our team to air operations, in particular High Altitude, High Opening (HAHO) jumps. The technique offered the best and most stealthy way to infiltrate a target. During a HAHO jump, you exit the aircraft, open your parachute a few seconds later, and fly your canopy to the landing zone.

I got my free-fall qualification at Team Five, but it wasn’t until I got to DEVGRU that I truly mastered the art of jumping.

Let me be clear, at first jumping out of an airplane scared me.

There is something unnatural about walking to the edge of the ramp and jumping out. Not only did it scare me, I hated it at first. I was the guy sucking down oxygen on the ride up. After every jump, when I was back on the ground, I loved it. But the next morning, I’d sweat it all over again. By forcing myself to do it over and over, eventually it became easier. Just like in BUD/S, quitting wasn’t an option and jumping was a big part of our job, so it was something I learned to love.

While I was with Delta on my 2005 deployment to Iraq, Phil successfully led a HAHO jump in Afghanistan. We always trained for this type of mission but I never thought I’d do one for real. Since I’d joined the command, I rotated between Iraq and Afghanistan, deployment after deployment. Things had fallen into a pattern of deployments, training, and standby. There were so many missions they started to blur together. We were rapidly gaining combat experience with each deployment. The command as a whole continually refined its tactics and had become even more combat effective.

In 2009, we finally got something different.

I was on personal leave, waiting for a commercial flight back to Virginia Beach, when I saw the breaking news bulletin flash across the TV screen in the airport. The Maersk Alabama, a cargo ship with seventeen thousand metric tons of cargo, was headed for Mombasa, Kenya, when Somali pirates attacked it in transit near the Horn of Africa. It was Wednesday, April 8, 2009. The pirates captured the Maersk Alabama’s captain, Richard Phillips, and fled with the captain in one of the ship’s eighteen-foot covered lifeboats. They had nine days of food rations. The USS Bainbridge, a destroyer, was shadowing the lifeboat, which was motoring about thirty miles off the Somali coast. Four pirates were on board armed with AK-47s.

Sitting in the airport, I wondered if we were going to get the call. Getting personal time off was a huge feat since my squadron was on standby and could be called to deploy anywhere in the world with an hour’s notice.

Watching the TV at the airport, I could see the orange lifeboat bobbing in the surf. Nearby was the gray-hulled USS Bainbridge. I tried to stand close so I could hear the report over the noise of the airport. Nothing was going on when I’d left Virginia Beach a few days earlier, but now I had a feeling we’d be getting a call. As footage of the lifeboat popped up on-screen again, my phone buzzed in my pocket. It was Phil.

“You watching the news?” he said.

“Yeah. Just saw it,” I said.

“Where you at?”

At this point, I was the most senior member of my team besides my team leader.

“I am at the airport,” I said. “I am literally waiting for my flight.”

“OK, good,” Phil said. “Get back as soon as you can.”

Instantly, I could feel my mind racing. The plane couldn’t fly fast enough. This mission was a once-in-a-lifetime chance. I didn’t want to miss it.

Boarding a plane is frustrating enough when you’re not in a rush. I watched as folks meandered to their seats or fussed with the overhead bins. I pleaded with them in my head to hurry. The sooner we took off, the faster I could get back to work. Plus, I knew once I was airborne I’d be in a communications blackout. There was no way to contact me if they got the word to go. For all I knew, as the flight attendant sealed the doors to my plane, I was getting the recall notice telling me I had one hour to get to the command, and by the time we landed the team would be gone.

Putting my headphones in, I tried to zone out but I couldn’t. Five steps from the gate after we landed in Virginia I was on the phone.

“Hey, what’s up?” I said when Phil picked up.

It was well after eight at night, since I’d come from the West Coast.

“Still here,” he said. “Come into work tomorrow early and I will get you up to speed. Planning is underway. But we’re waiting for D.C. to make a decision.”

The next morning, I was at work early. Phil met me in the squadron room. We sat down at the conference room table.

“We’ve got one hostage,” Phil said. “Four pirates. They want two million dollars for him.”

“Nothing like knowing exactly what you’re worth,” I said.

“I’d ask for more,” Phil said. “A couple of million seems a bit light, unless you ask my ex-wife.”

“Where are they going?” I asked.

“They want to link up with their buddies and try and get Phillips to a camp or a mother ship,” Phil said. “So, we’ve got to be ready to do a ship takedown or go over the beach and take out one of the camps.”

We’d spent years preparing for either mission.

“We’ve already got a handful of guys on the Bainbridge,” Phil said. “They were working in Africa and jumped in last night. Negotiations broke down Thursday.”

“How long do we have before they make shore?” I asked.

“They don’t want to make landfall where they are now because of some tribal issues,” Phil said. “Their tribe is a little farther south so they can’t make landfall for another two days, so hopefully we have a timeline to work against.”

I asked about the recall.

“No recall, but it’s being discussed,” Phil said.

“Why haven’t we heard anything yet?” I said. “It doesn’t make any sense that it takes this long to make a decision.”

“Dude, it’s Washington,” he said. “Does anything make sense?”

A day later, we finally got a page recalling us. Most of us were already at the command. Our gear was packed and ready.

About twenty hours later, the ramp of the C-17 cracked open and sunlight spilled into the cabin.

I could feel the breeze on my face as I shielded my eyes from the bright East African sun. Minutes later, I saw the small parachute attached to a massive gray high-speed assault craft (HSAC) snap open and start to drag the boat out of the back of the plane. The boats were loaded with all the gear we needed. The plan was to drop them and the crews first, followed by the assault teams.

CLICK. CLICK. CLICK.

I could hear the boat on the metal rollers as it started toward the door, picking up speed before disappearing off the ramp. Moments later, a second parachute opened and the gray blur of the second boat flew past as it shot out, followed by the boat crews.

“Yeah,” I yelled as I watched the boats go. Others around me cheered as the boat crews disappeared off the ramp.

My heart was beating faster, more from excitement than anything else, as I waited for the thumbs-up from my teammates on the ramp. They were watching to make sure the chutes on the boats opened.

We were jumping over the horizon from the USS Bainbridge so the pirates couldn’t see us. The USS Boxer, an amphibious assault ship used to carry Marines into battle, was going to rendezvous with us and we’d stage off of her deck.

In the water below, the boat crews landed near the HSACs and started clearing off the parachutes. We had thirty minutes to wait before we jumped, which seemed like much longer.

I was sitting near the front of the plane on one of the bench seats. On top of me was one of my squadron’s communications specialists. He was wearing a tandem passenger harness strapped to the front of me. Hours before, he’d learned that not only was he going to Africa to help us with a hostage situation but he was also going to jump into the Indian Ocean to do it.

In order to get all needed personnel down to the USS Boxer, we had to jump three tandem passengers, including the communications specialists. These three non-SEALs were essential support personnel. During the flight over, I had a chance to sit down with the communications tech and brief him.

“You’re mine,” I said to him. “You ready for this?”

He was thin with a short haircut and a bookish demeanor. He looked a little nervous when I started to go over the jump and what to expect.

“You ever jumped before?” I asked.

“No,” he said.

When we got the six-minute call, everyone stood up to do our last-minute checks. I noticed the communications specialist looked pale. He hadn’t said a word since the door opened the first time. At least my first jump was over Arizona. His was a real-world jump into the Indian Ocean.

“We’re going to be fine,” I said.

He didn’t look convinced.

The ramp opened again. There were about forty jumpers on the plane, and we lined up on the ramp.

“Stand by,” the jumpmaster yelled, giving us the signal that we had less than thirty seconds before the jump.

I could feel the communications specialist’s leg start to shake. It was practically vibrating as we got closer to the ramp.

“Hey, buddy, just relax,” I said.

All I needed him to do was remember everything I had told him.

“Green light, GO!”

The jumpmaster pointed off the ramp.

Up ahead, everyone started waddling to the ramp and diving off one by one. As we got closer to the ramp, I could see the sky and water meet at the horizon. I reached up and tapped my passenger on the shoulder twice and screamed over the wind into his ear.

“HANG!”

That was the signal to get into position. I wanted his toes hanging over the edge of the ramp so when we dove out I didn’t rake his shins on the ramp.

He froze. I could feel his feet try and dig into the ramp. I tapped him again and yelled.

“HANG!”

Again, he didn’t move.

We didn’t have time to wait. I pushed him forward and we dove off the ramp.

The drogue chute popped off my back. The small parachute helped stabilize us and controlled our speed during free fall. Just like during hundreds of other jumps, I went through my checks and pulled the handle and opened the main canopy.

Suddenly, all the airplane noise bled away and everything was perfectly quiet. The only sound was the chute snapping in the wind.

Looking around, it was beautiful. The fresh air was a welcome relief from the C-17 cabin. The sky and water were the same crystal blue and only a few wispy clouds were high above us. Scanning below me, I could see a maelstrom of parachutes all circling the four gray boats bobbing on the ocean below.

It looked like a World War II dogfight as my teammates swooped around in circles avoiding one another and coming to rest in the ocean.

The water was calm, with very small waves. Not far off I could see the flat deck of the USS Boxer waiting for us. As we came in, I flared out the parachute and splashed down into the bathtub-temperature water. Unhooking the communications specialist, I started to work my way out of the parachute harness.

We weren’t more than twenty yards from the boat. Sliding my flippers off my ankles, where I’d taped them for the jump, I started to swim over to the communications specialist. Behind me, the chute started to slip below the surface as the reserve parachute filled with water, dragging it to the bottom. I swam up to the communications specialist as he paddled, in a life jacket, toward the ladder hanging off the boat.

“How was it, dude?” I said.

“That was crazy,” he said.

It was the first time I saw him smile since the ramp opened.

Climbing aboard the HSAC, I found a place near the front while we waited to get a head count. Since the boats were only built for twelve people, it got crowded quickly. I climbed to the bow and let my feet dangle in the water. I let the current push my fins around.

“Hey man, did you see any sharks?” one teammate said to me as he climbed into the bow area.

“No,” I said. I knew the waters around here were infested, but I hadn’t noticed anything coming in.

“Dude, as I was coming in I saw this massive shadow below,” he said.

I slid my fins closer to the boat.

During our flight over, Phillips tried to escape, ratcheting up tensions. He made it into the water before being fished out at gunpoint. The pirates bound the captain’s hands and threw a phone and American two-way radio into the ocean, thinking the captain was somehow taking orders from the ship.

By now, the lifeboat was out of fuel and was adrift. Commander Frank Castellano, captain of the USS Bainbridge, persuaded the pirates to be towed by the destroyer, and to allow the ship’s rigid-hulled inflatable boat to deliver food and water. During one of the supply runs, the fourth pirate, Abduhl Wal-i-Musi, asked for medical attention for a cut hand. He was transferred to the Bainbridge for treatment. He’d been injured when Phillips attempted to escape.

After setting up on the USS Boxer on Saturday, we sent a small team over to the USS Bainbridge. The rest of the squadron was told to hold tight. In the event that the lifeboat made landfall, we would be forced to attempt a rescue mission on shore.

The team that went over to the Bainbridge was made up of an assault team, multiple snipers, and a small command element. The SEALs set up an overwatch position on the fantail of the Bainbridge. Snipers started a rotating watch as negotiations continued. We waited patiently for the situation to develop.

On Sunday, we suddenly got word that Phillips was now on board the USS Bainbridge and safe. Soon all the guys were back and I ran into my friend Gary. He was in the class ahead of me during BUD/S. Gary came to Green Team a few years after me. He started his SEAL career driving mini-subs. It was funny to think of him folding his six-foot-four-inch frame into the sub. He was awarded a Silver Star on the last deployment. He literally stitched up five guys trying to flank his element during a mission in Kandahar. Gary went over to the Bainbridge and was in charge of interrogating the captured pirate Wal-i-Musi.

We shook hands.

“Dude, holy shit, give me some scoop.” I said.

“We caught the last one when he popped his head up and smoke checked all three,” Gary said.

Gary told me he was tasked with talking to the injured pirate, Musi. Gary hoped the pirate could persuade his comrades to surrender. Gary started killing Musi with kindness when he got to the Bainbridge.

“Hey, man, want some ice cream?” he said. “How about a cold Coke?”

Musi and Gary struck up a quick friendship over food and comfort. Gary kept Musi out in the open so the other pirates could see him drinking Cokes and eating ice cream. Since the pirates still on the lifeboat had to yell back and forth to negotiate.

“I can’t hear,” Gary told Musi. “Tell them to pull the rope in.”

Musi agreed and the line got shorter and shorter, the lifeboat inching closer to the Bainbridge. The seas were getting rough and with no engine the lifeboat was getting tossed around. As it got dark, Gary and his teammates pulled the lifeboat even closer. It was pitch-black and there was no way the pirates could tell they were being pulled closer to the USS Bainbridge. On the fantail, Gary and his teammates scanned the lifeboat. Infrared lasers that can be seen only through night vision goggles danced over the skin of the boat.

One of the pirates always sat on top of the covered area keeping watch; engaging him would be simple. They could also see one pirate through the window steering the boat, another relatively easy target. But the third pirate was always hidden, and they needed to take out all three at the same time. The only way to take the shots and ensure Phillips’s safety was to get the third pirate to expose himself. Finally, after hours of waiting, on Sunday night the third pirate’s head and shoulders emerged from the rear hatch of the lifeboat. That was all the snipers needed. The orders stated, only act if Phillips’s life was in imminent danger. With tensions already high, and fearing for Phillips’s safety, my teammates opened fire. In seconds, all three pirates crumbled under the barrage.

After the last of the sniper shots rang out, the team on the fantail heard one unmistakable crack from a pirate’s AK-47. The single shot echoed over the water, and my teammates were immediately deflated. The stakes were high. Washington was getting frequent updates, and they were watching drone feeds of the lifeboat. The commanding officer of DEVGRU and our squadron commander were both on the USS Boxer.

Fearing the worst and not knowing if Phillips was dead or wounded, two snipers near the towline jumped up and started to slither down the rope to the boat. There was no time to waste. Balancing on top of the towline, which bobbed inches above the dark waves, they reached the boat in minutes. Armed with only pistols, they boarded the lifeboat and swung inside the enclosure. There was a single opening into the raft, making them an easy target for even a wounded pirate.

Entering the life raft, they quickly and methodically reengaged each pirate, making sure there was no more threat. They found Phillips tied up in the corner, unhurt. The USS Bainbridge’s rigid-hull inflatable boat carrying a handful of SEALs was shadowing the lifeboat. When they heard the shots, the boat raced in and the SEALs pulled Phillips off the lifeboat.

Back on the Bainbridge, before the last shot rang out, Gary grabbed Musi and slammed him onto the deck.

“You’re going to jail,” he said. “Your buddies are dead. You’re useless to me now.”

With his hands cuffed and a hood pulled over his head, Musi was led away.

Gary met Phillips at the fantail. The captain was confused and disoriented as he climbed on board the Bainbridge.

“Why did you guys have to do that?” Phillips said.

He was suffering from a minor case of Stockholm syndrome and in the shock of the shootings, he didn’t understand what had just happened and why.

Phillips underwent a medical exam and was found to be in relatively good condition. It didn’t take long before the Stockholm syndrome wore off. He was thankful for what my teammates had done. He called his family and was flown to the USS Boxer before heading home to Vermont.

The rest of us spent a few more days on the USS Boxer, waiting for follow-on orders before moving ashore and then flying home. It felt good to finally save a life instead of just taking guys out. It was cool to do something outside of Iraq and Afghanistan. I was happy to do something different. But the downside was we got a glimpse of the Washington machine and just how slow the decision-making could be. We were ready to launch on this days before we actually got the call. But the Captain Phillips mission renewed our capabilities and put us on Washington’s radar for other high-profile missions.