Iran broadcast to ships in the Strait of Hormuz that the vital oil and gas channel is once again closed to maritime traffic, with owners reporting gunfire in the waterway and ships abandoning efforts to transit after a brief spell when it appeared it might reopen.
The radio transmission, heard by two owners with vessels in the area, came around the time as state-run news agency Nour reported that the strait had gone back to “strict management and control by the armed forces.”
The fresh closure was the culmination of hours of chaos and confusion that saw some ships race to get out, only to U-turn. One supertanker issued a radio broadcast that it was coming under gunfire, the two shipowners said, asking not to be identified because of the security situation.
A UK naval group also warned that a tanker was approached by two Iranian gun boats and fired upon without warning. It subsequently reported another ship was hit by an unknown projectile.
On Friday evening local time, Iran’s foreign minister said the strait was fully open, causing oil prices to plunge and tankers to rush to exit. Shortly after, US President Donald Trump repeated that it was open, but warned that an American blockade on Iranian shipping would remain.
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Closed by Saturday
Iran said that was unacceptable and, by Saturday, Hormuz was once again blocked.
While some ships did manage to go through, several shipowners quickly abandoned plans to evacuate ships that have been stuck in the region for weeks. A total of 12 freighters were observed leaving, although half of them had Iran links.
At least nine laden crude oil tankers performed u-turns and abandoned their outbound transits. Four container vessels operated by France’s CMA CGM SA were observed turning around in the same area. The company declined to comment. Several liquefied natural gas carriers also came to a stop before getting to the waterway.
The broadcast, relayed to Bloomberg by the owners, said that the re-closure was because of “the failure of the United States government to fulfill its commitments in the negotiations.”
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Any vessel attempting to enter Hormuz “will be met with a severe response from the IRGC navy and will be destroyed,” it said.
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Abbas Araghchi, Iran’s foreign minister, had said on Friday that Hormuz was “completely open” to commercial shipping for the duration of a 10-day ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Even after his post on X drove down oil prices and encouraged ships to attempt transits, more than a dozen owners, traders and brokers said they would taking a wait-and-see approach regarding navigation of the waterway.
“The information is quite fluid at present,” Arsenio Dominguez, secretary general of the International Maritime Organisation, said in a Bloomberg TV interview. “Companies and shipowners continue to be cautious on this, that’s the call that I made yesterday. We need to verify what is happening.”
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