U.S. & World

MOMBASA, Kenya (CBS News) ― Somali pirates vowed to hunt down American ships and kill their sailors and French forces detained 11 other brigands in a high-seas raid as tensions ratcheted up Wednesday off Africa's volatile eastern coast.

Pirates fired grenades and automatic weapons at an American freighter loaded with food aid but the ship escaped and was heading to Kenya under U.S. Navy guard.

The Liberty Sun's American crew successfully blockaded themselves inside the engine room - the same tactic that the Maersk Alabama crew used to thwart last week's attack on their ship. They were not injured in the attack Tuesday night but the vessel sustained some damage, owner Liberty Maritime Corp. said.

"We are under attack by pirates, we are being hit by rockets. Also bullets," crew member Thomas Urbik told his mother by e-mail. "We are barricaded in the engine room and so far no one is hurt. (A) rocket penetrated the bulkhead but the hole is small. Small fire, too, but put out."

Commander Jane Campbell of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command in Bahrain told CBS News the USS Bainbridge - the destroyer that had been en route to deliver the rescued captain of the hijacked Maersk Alabama to Kenya - sailed to its aid. It responded from a distance of approximately 140 miles.

One of the pirates whose gang attacked the Liberty Sun said Wednesday his group was specifically targeting American ships and sailors.

"We will seek out the Americans and if we capture them we will slaughter them," said a 25-year-old pirate based in the Somali port of Harardhere who gave only his first name, Ismail.

"We will target their ships because we know their flags. Last night, an American-flagged ship escaped us by a whisker. We have showered them with rocket-propelled grenades," boasted Ismail, who did not take part in the attack.

The French forces launched an early morning attack on a pirate "mother ship" after spotting the boat Tuesday with a surveillance helicopter and observing the pirates overnight.

A "mother ship" is usually a seized foreign vessel that pirates use to transport speedboats far out to sea and resupply them as they plot their attacks. The ship was intercepted 550 miles (900 kilometers) east of the Kenyan city of Mombasa.

The French Defense Ministry said the raid thwarted the sea bandits' planned attack on the Liberian cargo ship Safmarine Asia. The detained pirates were being held on the Nivose, a French frigate among the international fleet trying to protect shipping in the Gulf of Aden.

The attack on the Liberty Sun foiled the reunion between the American sea captain rescued by Navy snipers and the 19-man crew of the Maersk Alabama who he saved with his heroism.

Capt. Richard Phillips had planned to meet his crew in Mombasa and fly home with them Wednesday, but he was stuck on the USS Bainbridge when it was diverted to help the Liberty Sun. The crew left without him, flying to Andrews Air Force base in Maryland in a chartered plane.

"It's nice he's finally headed home," Judi Quinn-Roy told The Early Show Wednesday about her brother Michael Quinn, a crew member from the Maersk. "I wanted him to get out of Kenya."

Quinn-Roy told Early Show co-anchor Maggie Rodriguez that her brother was still traumatized by the ordeal.

"He's having nightmares about being in the dark room where they were hiding, and the pirates shooting into the dark... So, they're still thinking about it," Quinn-Roy said.

Despite President Barack Obama's vow to take action against the rise in banditry and the deaths of five pirates in French and U.S. hostage rescues, brigands seized four vessels and more than 75 hostages since Sunday's dramatic rescue of Phillips.

That brought the total number of sailors being held by Somali pirates to over 300 on 16 different ships - a distinct surge in the number of captives over the last few days.

Pirates can extort $1 million or more for each ship and crew seized off the Horn of Africa - and Kenya estimates they raked in $150 million last year.

The Liberty Sun was carrying aid including rice, cooking oil, plywood and other supplies, said Urbik's mother, Katy Urbik of Wheaton, Ill.

Her 26-year-old son had been e-mailing her updates on the voyage every 36 to 48 hours. A member of the Marine Engineer Benefit Union who lives in Batavia, Ill., he had been working on the ship since Feb. 13.

She was nervous as he told her Sunday the vessel was heading into pirate-patrolled waters, but somewhat relieved when he told her early Tuesday the crew was reporting its position to the Navy every six hours.

"I'm thinking, 'If the Navy's monitoring him, and they have all these preparations made, I think they're going to make it,"' she recalled in an interview.

(© 2010 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)