The American ship’s captain taken hostage by Somali pirates gave his first account yesterday of his failed escape attempt and eventual rescue by US Navy Seals.

Captain Richard Phillips, who was held for five days aboard a lifeboat in the Indian Ocean, described how he pushed a urinating pirate overboard and jumped in himself in an attempt to gain freedom before being recaptured.

In his first television interview since his rescue on April 12, with his wife, Andrea, at his side, Captain Phillips told the NBC Today show that he never thought he would survive.

Describing his thoughts aboard the lifeboat, he said: “It was just settling everything. Getting ready to die and just settling everything. You know, saying my last thoughts: Andrea, the kids.”

The former Boston taxi driver, who has been a seaman for 20 years, said he baked in the 18ft fibreglass lifeboat as it bobbed in the Indian Ocean. “It was very, very hot on the lifeboat — very, very hot. You just soaked in sweat. You’re dirty. It was strange, because when the sun came up, I sort of dreaded the sun because of the heat, and to be up the next 12, 13 hours.”

Captain Phillips tried to escape when he saw two of his captors dozing and the other urinating over the side. “I saw him put his rifle, his gun, down, his AK47, and proceed to urinate, both hands. And that’s when I — that was just a second decision, and I just went,” he said. “I had to push him in first. He was a little startled, so he let out a yelp. I learnt later Somalis don’t like to be in the water at night. And then, as I said, there was an AK47 there. I didn’t know how to operate that, so it was just a split-second — ‘I can’t do that’. And I dove off the side.”

Captain Phillips swam about 50ft towards a US warship shadowing the lifeboat a quarter to a half-mile away, before the pirates fired shots to force him back. From then on he was tied up and had a gun pointed at him.

On Easter Sunday US navy snipers shot dead the three pirates still holding Captain Phillips aboard the lifeboat. He thought initially that it was a disagreement between the pirates. “I heard the shots. I felt the fibreglass of the boat. I just wanted to get as low as I could,” he said. “I figured they knew where I was. I basically tried to stay in the same place.”

A Russian naval destroyer, the Admiral Panteleev, seized 29 suspected pirates off the coast of Somalia yesterday, the Defence Ministry said. “Seven Kalashnikov machineguns, handguns of different calibres, equipment including satellite navigation devices and a large number of empty shells were discovered on board the boat,” the ministry said.

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