Iran08 October, 20263 min read
Attacks on Tankers Cut Strait of Hormuz Transits to Two-Month Low
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Seven commodity vessels transited the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, lowest in over two months. Attacks on tankers last week coincided with the traffic drop, highest since start of the war.
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Bonuses as transits drop
Shipping data showed the number of vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz fell to the lowest level in more than two months after attacks on tankers reached their highest level last week since the start of the US-Israeli war with Iran. Kpler data cited by Reuters said seven commodity vessels passed through the strait on Tuesday, the lowest figure since July 23, and Kpler analysts Emmanuel Belostrino and Yui Torikata wrote that crude crossing the strait fell 27% from a wartime high to at least 10.1 million barrels a day. Captains could earn base salaries of as much as $100,000 plus a $50,000 bonus per voyage through the strait, with the Financial Times reporting the figures.
Reuters said the figures exclude vessels crossing with their Automatic Identification System transponders turned off to avoid detection, and LSEG data showed eight ships crossed the strait on Tuesday, evenly divided between entries and exits. Al Jazeera said shipping traffic through the besieged Strait of Hormuz fell to its lowest level since July this week, while oil exports from the Middle East rose above pre-war levels at the end of last month despite ongoing attacks on tankers in the Strait of Hormuz.
Competing claims and quotes
Ali Mohammadi, the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) Navy’s deputy for political affairs, dismissed Trump’s claims about the Strait of Hormuz as lies and said, “The Americans claim they are getting oil and ships through the Strait of Hormuz.” Ali Mohammadi added that “there is no way for any vessel to operate in the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz or the Sea of Oman without being detected by IRGC forces,” speaking from the city of Qom. Reuters said attacks on tankers sailing through Hormuz hit their highest last week of any week since the Iran war began, and the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations agency reported projectiles struck a tanker 51 nautical miles north of Qatar's Madinat ash Shamal with casualties reported.
The Reuters account also said the number of vessels transiting the strait edged up to 10 on Wednesday but remained well short of the daily tally of more than 20 on Sunday and Monday. Al Jazeera reported that Iran launched strikes at ships making the crossing without its express permission, while the US imposed a naval blockade on Iranian ports due to Tehran’s closure and escorted some vessels through the waterway.
What is at stake next
Kpler analysts Emmanuel Belostrino and Yui Torikata wrote that most of the fall in transits was in ship-to-ship transfers in the Gulf of Oman, while exports from the Gulf of Oman coast and the Red Sea rose to 6.7 million bpd. Reuters said this helped keep overall exports of Middle East crude at the pre-war level, even as the number of vessels transiting the strait remained constrained. Data from Kpler showed about 40 percent of oil leaving the region was exported via Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline or via ship-to-ship transfers by smaller boats carrying out risky ship-to-ship transfers.
Data was hard to determine because many smaller shuttle boats were turning off their transponders to avoid detection when travelling through the strait before offloading oil to larger tankers waiting beyond it. Reuters described the wider baseline for the waterway as about 125 large commercial vessels going through the strait each day before the February 28 start of the Iran war, with cargoes accounting for a fifth of global supplies of crude oil and liquefied natural gas.