An HMS Hermes aircraft disrupts a pirate seizure

Royal Navy carriers and submarines participated in counter-piracy work around Hong Kong and the South China Sea. In this case, pirates repainted the captured Tung Chow and disguised it as the Japanese ship Toyamaru. They took her south toward Bias Bay on 1 February 1935, but a search aircraft from HMS Hermes alarmed them into landing and fleeing inland without hostages and with almost no loot. The destroyer HMS Dainty found Tung Chow later that evening, and those aboard were saved. The carrier's aircraft had produced a decisive policing effect through search and visible pressure without delivering a strike.