Oil and liquefied natural gas tankers resumed sailing through the Strait of Hormuz on Monday, signalling a tentative recovery in maritime traffic despite renewed Iranian claims over the weekend that the strategic waterway had been closed. Shipping data showed a gradual return of commercial vessel movements through the strait, one of the world’s most important energy chokepoints, although transit volumes remain well below levels seen before the latest escalation in hostilities involving Iran.
Four LNG carriers operated by Qatar entered the Gulf through the strait on Monday, while two Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs), each capable of transporting up to 2 million barrels of oil, also sailed into the Gulf. One of the supertankers listed Iraq’s southern oil hub of Basra as its destination, according to vessel-tracking data and analysis from Kpler.
Meanwhile, two smaller crude tankers carrying a combined total of nearly 2 million barrels of oil exited the Gulf through the Strait of Hormuz and entered the Gulf of Oman, according to MarineTraffic data. “While daily transits remain below the 125 crossings prior to the Iran hostilities, the trend is positive,” shipbroker Clarksons said in a market note on Monday.
Industry sources cautioned that actual traffic levels may be higher than publicly available data suggests, as some vessels could be transiting with their Automatic Identification System (AIS) transponders switched off. Intermittent AIS outages have also been reported in the region.
Kpler data showed that only five vessels passed through the strait on Sunday, down sharply from 26 the previous day. Among them were three VLCCs carrying approximately 2 million barrels each of Saudi crude and fuel oil, including one bound for Japan. The US Navy-led Joint Maritime Information Center said commercial traffic through the strait was beginning to increase, with vessels continuing to favour routes through Omani territorial waters as well as the northern passage controlled by Iran.
The US Central Command reported that 55 merchant vessels transited the Strait of Hormuz on Saturday, carrying more than 17 million barrels of oil destined for international markets.