After firefighters put out a fire on a tanker that was attacked by the Houthi group in Yemen a day earlier, commodities trader Trafigura said on Saturday that it was evaluating the security risks of further voyages in the Red Sea.
After the Marlin Luanda was struck by a Houthi anti-ship missile, the U.S. military reported that a ship from the U.S. Navy and other vessels provided assistance.
A statement from Trafigura stated, “No further vessels operating on behalf of Trafigura are currently transiting the Gulf of Aden.” Additionally, the company continued, “We continue to assess carefully the risks involved in any voyage, including in respect of security and safety of the crew, together with shipowners and customers.”
To avoid being attacked by Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthi group, which began launching waves of exploding drones and missiles at vessels on Nov. 19 in response to Israel’s military operations in Gaza, some shipping companies have suspended transits through the Red Sea, which can be accessed from the Gulf of Aden. Additionally, they have taken significantly longer and more expensive routes around Africa.
Container ships traveling through the Red Sea have been the main target of the Houthi attacks. The route has been utilized by numerous fuel tankers.
QatarEnergy, the second-largest exporter of liquefied natural gas in the world, is a notable exception. This month, the company stopped sending tankers through the Red Sea due to security concerns.
According to a statement released by Trafigura’s, the crew of the Marlin Luanda battled a fire in one cargo tank on the vessel’s starboard side for several hours early on Saturday.
Trafigura stated that the fire had been put out by Saturday afternoon and that the entire crew was safe.
Trafigura said, “The vessel is now sailing towards a safe harbor,” and he added that Indian, American, and French navy vessels had helped fight the fire.
U.S. Central Command stated in a post on X, formerly Twitter, that the Marshall Islands-flagged Marlin Luanda reported damage and made a distress call on Friday. It stated that the tanker was receiving assistance from the coalition ships, including the USS Carney.
An Indian Navy spokesman stated that after receiving a distress call from the Marlin Luanda, which had 22 Indian and one Bangladeshi crew on board, India’s navy dispatched the guided missile destroyer INS Visakhapatnam.
A Trafigura spokesperson stated on Friday that the tanker was carrying Russian naphtha purchased below the price cap in accordance with G7 sanctions.
In recent weeks, dozens of retaliatory strikes against Houthi forces in Yemen have been carried out by warplanes, ships, and submarines from the United States and the United Kingdom in response to the Houthi attacks on shipping.
According to Central Command, the U.S. military destroyed a Houthi anti-ship missile that was aimed into the Red Sea and prepared to launch approximately eight hours after the Marlin Luanda incident.
According to the statement, the missile “presented an imminent threat to merchant vessels and the U.S. Navy ships in the region.”
Al-Masira, the Houthi television network, reported on Saturday that the port of Ras Issa, Yemen’s primary oil export terminal, was the target of two air strikes by the United States and Britain.
The United States Fifth Fleet did not immediately respond to a request for comment, making it unclear whether this was the strike that Central Command was referring to.
The British Ministry of Defense declined to respond.
