Tanker Attacks Spread Beyond the Strait of Hormuz as Gulf Freight Costs Soar
At a Glance A Tanker Is Struck Off Qatar as Gulf Attacks Surge An unnamed tanker was struck by multiple projectiles 51 nautical miles off Madinat ash Shamal, Qatar, according to an October 7 report from UK Maritime Trade Operations. UKMTO has reported 16 attacks on ships in the Middle East Gulf in the past…
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War-Diverted Traffic Is Reshaping NEOM’s Port. What Happens If Hormuz Reopens?
At a Glance A Port Not Behaving Like the Megacity It Was Built For By any reasonable metric, 2026 should have been a difficult year for the Port of NEOM. The megacity it was built to serve has been through a visible contraction. The Public Investment Fund wrote down the giga-projects by $8 billion at…
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What a 25-Day AIS Blackout Off Libya Tells Us About Mediterranean Narcotics Routes
At a Glance The 25-Day Gap Between Albania and Libya In late August 2026, a Mali-flagged general cargo vessel left an Albanian port, declared Egypt as its destination, and switched off its AIS transponder in open water off eastern Libya. For 25 days and 8 hours, nothing was transmitted. When it reappeared on September 23,…
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Vessels Loiter Over Subsea Cables and Pipelines Across Five Theaters
At a Glance Chinese Survey Grids Converge on the Guam and Japan Cable Corridors Two Chinese state-linked vessels have spent September running structured survey grids over separate transpacific subsea cable corridors, one around the Guam cable hub and one over the Japan to U.S. cables east of Japan. A Chinese-flagged fishery patrol vessel operated by…
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