Somali pirates fired rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons at another US cargo ship in a failed hijack attempt.

AN American ship’s captain was freed unharmed yesterday in a US Navy operation that killed three of the four Somali pirates who had been holding him for days in a lifeboat off the coast of Africa, a senior US intelligence official said.

PENTAGON officials said yesterday that the American crew of a US-flagged cargo ship had retaken control from Somali pirates who hijacked the vessel far off the Horn of Africa.