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One pirate was reported to be under the control of the crew. The status of the other pirates was not immediately known, but a U.S. official said they were reported to be "in the water," the Associated Press reported.

The chief executive of the company that owns the container ship told a news conference in Norfolk, Va., that he could neither confirm nor deny the retaking of the 17,000-ton Maersk Alabama.

"Speculation is a dangerous thing when you're in a fluid environment," John Reinhart, CEO of Maersk Line Ltd., told reporters. "I will not confirm that the crew has overtaken this ship."

But Capt. Joseph Murphy, an instructor at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy, told AP that his son Shane, the second in command on the ship, had called him to say the crew had regained control.

"The crew is back in control of the ship," a U.S. official said at midday Eastern time, AP reported. "It's reported that one pirate is on board under crew control -- the other three were trying to flee," the official said. The status of the other pirates was unknown, the official said, but they were reported to "be in the water."

Somali pirates seized the U.S.-operated container ship Wednesday with 20 American crew members on board, the latest in a spate of pirate attacks that have drawn an international flotilla of naval vessels to the waters off Somalia's coast.

A U.S. Navy spokeswoman, Cmdr. Jane Campbell, confirmed the attack on the Maersk Alabama, which was carrying food aid. She said it was the first seizure in recent memory of a U.S.-operated ship.

Campbell also noted that the pirates, who have been operating a multimillion-dollar shakedown business mostly in the crowded shipping lanes in the Gulf of Aden, seem to be moving south to the less-controlled, open sea off Somalia's vast coast -- a shoreline roughly the length of the East Coast of the United States.

The Maersk Alabama was seized 500 miles south of the Gulf of Aden transit routes where most of the 20 or so naval vessels are patrolling, Campbell said. The nearest navy ship was about 300 miles away.

"It's an incredibly vast area, and basically we're seeing pirates in more than a million-square-mile operating area," said Campbell, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet, based in Bahrain. "So while the presence of naval vessels has had an effect, we continue to say that naval presence alone will never be a total solution. It starts ashore."

That shore belongs to Somalia, where a newly elected transitional government is struggling to contain an Islamist insurgency with ties to al-Qaeda. Somalia's three main pirate networks are controlled by clan-based militias, which have so far remained separate from the Islamist insurgent group known as al-Shabab.

According to a businessman based in the Somali capital of Mogadishu who is in contact with the pirates who attacked the ship, the pirates did not know that the crew was American. The businessman spoke on the condition of anonymity for security reasons.

The Maersk Alabama is owned and operated by Maersk Line Ltd., which is based in Norfolk and part of the Copenhagen-headquartered A.P. Moller Maersk Group, according to a statement on the company's Web site.

It was the sixth ship to be seized in the past week, said Andrew Mwangura, coordinator for the East African Seafarer's Assistance Program based in Mombasa, Kenya, where the Maersk Alabama was headed.

Mwangura said the attack marks a rise in a piracy problem that cost companies $150 million in ransom last year. The attacks had been stemmed in recent months by patrolling navy ships sent from the United States, Russia, China, Turkey and Pakistan, among other nations.

There are now 18 ships being held by Somali pirates, a wily bunch who deploy a high- and low-tech arsenal of satellite phones, rocket-propelled grenades and wooden ladders to take over the massive container ships. Although there is no word yet on the fate of the Maersk Alabama crew, the pirates usually take sailors onto shore and begin negotiating hefty ransoms that fund lavish lifestyles centered in Somalia's pirate capital of Eyl, along the coast.

Campbell said that despite the deployment of heavily armed ships to combat piracy, at least three shipping companies have managed to fend off pirates recently using relatively low-tech methods.

One simply zigzagged, outmaneuvering the pirates, who typically attack in 15-foot skiffs. Another used flares and a water hose. The third one: old-fashioned barbed wire.

"These boats are usually armed to the teeth with RPGs and automatic weapons, but the method of boarding is literally tilting a ladder and climbing," she said. "In this case, when they got to the top of the ladder, the barbed wire was there."

Maritime officials reported that the pirate attack on the Maersk Alabama began late at night and lasted about five hours. Up to three pirate skiffs were said to be involved. The container ship's crew tried to take evasive action before the pirates eventually were able to board it.

Piracy experts attribute the recent surge in successful hijackings largely to an improvement in the weather in recent weeks.