Oil tanker is hit by explosion off of Saudi Arabia in attack from ‘external source’
- The Singapore-flagged BW Rhine suffered an explosion off the port of Jeddah
- It is the fourth assault targeting Saudi energy infrastructure in the last month
- The Red Sea had previously avoided the chaos of shipping wars involving Iran
An oil tanker was rocked by an explosion off the Saudi coast today after being hit by an ‘external source’, the ship’s owner said, in what is feared to be the latest in a string of attacks linked to the war in Yemen.
The explosion on the Singapore-flagged BW Rhine, which caused a fire on board the tanker off the port of Jeddah, marks the fourth assault in a month targeting Saudi energy infrastructure.
While nobody has claimed responsibility, it comes as Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen step up cross-border attacks against Saudi targets in retaliation for the five-year military campaign led by Riyadh.
The Saudi government recently accused the Houthis of dumping mines into the southern Red Sea, which could be carried toward Jeddah.
It also renews concerns about ship safety in the Red Sea, a crucial transit zone for global shipping and energy supplies that had largely avoided the chaos of last year’s tensions in the Gulf involving the US and Iran.
The oil tanker BW Rhine (file photo) suffered an explosion early Monday after being hit by ‘an external source,’ a shipping company said
The BW Rhine had berthed at Jeddah on Saturday, carrying over 60,000 metric tons of unleaded gasoline from an Aramco refinery.
On Monday it was ‘been hit from an external source whilst discharging,’ said Haifna, a tanker company under the BW Group that owns and operates the ship.
The explosion caused a fire on board the ship, but all 22 seafarers escaped without injury and firefighters later extinguished the blaze. But some oil may have polluted the water along the ship and the company said it was still assessing the damage.
The blast also apparently shut down Jeddah port, the most important shipping point for the kingdom, although Saudi Arabia had not acknowledged the blast hours later.
The UK’s Marine Trade Operations, an organisation under the Royal Navy, urged ships in the area to exercise caution and said investigations were ongoing.
It later said the port of Jeddah had been shut down for a ‘duration unknown,’ without elaborating.
The incident comes after an explosion last month rocked a Greek-operated oil tanker docked at Saudi Arabia’s southern port of Shuqaiq, an attack that the Riyadh-led military coalition blamed on Yemen’s Houthi rebels.
Also last month, the Houthi rebels said they struck a Saudi oil plant with a Quds-2 missile which tore a hole in an oil tank, triggering an explosion and fire.
Saudi Arabia is stuck in a military quagmire in Yemen, which has been locked in conflict since the rebels took control of the capital Sanaa in 2014 and went on to seize much of the north.
Riyadh led a coalition that intervened to support the internationally recognised government the following year, but the conflict has shown no signs of abating since.
Saudi Arabia has repeatedly accused regional rival Iran of supplying sophisticated weapons to the Houthis, a charge Tehran denies.
Tens of thousands of people, mostly civilians, have been killed and millions displaced in Yemen’s war, which the United Nations has called the world’s worst humanitarian disaster.
The Houthis have used sea mines before in their long war against a Saudi-led coalition, although they have not commented on today’s attack.
Seagulls fly in front of the port city of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, where an explosion rocked a ship off the Red Sea coast on Monday
The incidents come after tensions between the U.S. and Iran last year saw a series of escalating incidents in the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz and the nearby Gulf of Oman.
While the U.S. has put together a new coalition to monitor shipping there after those incidents, it doesn’t operate in the Red Sea.
In recent weeks, an attack in Iran killed a prominent scientist who founded Tehran’s military nuclear program two decades ago, an assault suspected to have been carried out by Israel.
The attack nudged up oil prices, which already had been rising in recent days as Western countries begin distributing coronavirus vaccines. Benchmark Brent crude stood above $50 a barrel in trading Monday.
The Red Sea, with the Suez Canal to the north and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait to the south, is a vital shipping lane for both cargo and global energy supplies.
The sea has been mined previously. In 1984, some 19 ships reported striking mines there, with only one ever being recovered and disarmed, according to a UN panel of experts investigating Yemen´s war.
Any new mining could endanger global shipping and be difficult to find for any minesweeping operation – raising the risks and potentially the cost of insurance for those sailing in the region.
‘The series of escalations in the Red Sea will certainly raise the risk profile of the region,’ said Ranjith Raja, the head of Middle East and North Africa oil and shipping research at Refinitiv.
‘This could in turn also increase the insurance premiums for added protection on vessels operating in the region, which would have an impact on the cost of shipment.’
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