Somali Pirate Kingpin Calls It Quits as Hijackings Plummet

Have we reached ' and passed ' Peak Pirate?

The dread Somali pirate Mohamed Abdi Hassan ' also known as 'Afweyne,' or 'Big Mouth' ' is retiring from the hijacking life. Big Mouth has picked a good time to get out of the game: Piracy is way, way down.

'After being in piracy for eight years,' Big Mouth told a press conference (!) in Somalia on Thursday, 'I have decided to renounce and quit, and from today on I will not be involved in this gang activity.'

Hassan played a huge role in the late-2000s resurgence of piracy in the northern Indian Ocean. He and his crew pulled off two of the most audacious hijackings on the high seas in recent history. In 2008, he captured a Saudi-owned supertanker, the Sirius Star, loaded with $100 million worth of oil and about the size of a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier. Hassan got $3 million for the Sirius Star ' he had initially demanded $25 million ' and the notoriety of hijacking the biggest vessel in history.

But Big Mouth arguably one-upped himself later that year. His team bum-rushed a Ukrainian ship the MV Faina, packed with weapons: anti-aircraft guns, rocket-propelled grenades and at least 30 T-72 tanks. Hassan didn't care about the arms. He wanted cash ' and after over 100 days of maritime drama, helicopters hovering over the Faina dropped him over $3 million. As it turned out, the ship was bound for the separatist army of South Sudan, which helps explain Big Mouth's windfall.

Piracy isn't what it used to be, however. Gone are the days when dead Somali pirates washed ashore carrying $153,000 in cash. According to the International Maritime Board, from January to September 2012, Somali pirates attacked vessels 70 times, down from 199 such assaults during that period in 2011. From July to September 2012, only one ship near Somali waters came under attack, a major drop from the 36 attacks that time the previous year. (Though it's worth noting that pirates take a summer vacation.) Stepped-up international naval patrols ' including dramatic Navy SEAL rescues ' help explain why even piracy isn't recession-proof.

Still, Somali piracy has merely fallen to its 2009 levels, and in 2009, pirate attacks were a global concern. Big Mouth told journalists he was 'encouraging many of my colleagues to renounce piracy too.' If you can take the pirate at his word ' and just consider that phrase for a moment ' some of his fellow hijackers are going to be more likely to see a market, however shrinking, cleared of a major competitor.