Tankers News

One person has died and another is missing after a commercial tanker struck a recreation vessel near Port Aransas, Texas.The U.S. Coast Guard said it received a call from a good Samaritan via channel 16 at 5:28 a.m. reporting the collision between. The recreational vessel, reported to be a commercial pleasure boat, became partially submerged, and the four people on board went into the water.After receiving the call, the Coast Guard issued an urgent marine information broadcast…

A Chevron-chartered oil tanker seized by Iran more than a year ago has dropped anchor near the United Arab Emirates port of Khor Fakkan, ship tracking data showed on Monday.The Marshall Islands-flagged Advantage Sweet was boarded by Iran's military in the Gulf of Oman in April 2023 after an alleged collision with an Iranian boat.After sailing away from Iran last week, its latest position was located close to the UAE, LSEG data showed on Monday.A Chevron spokesperson said on Saturday it was aware of reports that the tanker was released on July 10."We are pleased to see the safe release of the v

Danish pure play product tanker company TORM on Monday announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire eight secondhand MR vessels in a $340 million cash and stock deal. TORM did not name the seller.The vessels have all been built by South Korea's Hyundai Mipo Dockyard in 2014 and 2015, and six of the vessels have been fitted with scrubbers. TORM said it expects to take delivery of the vessels during the third and fourth quarters of this year.The purchase price, which includes a cash consideration of $238 million and the issuance of approximately 2.65 million shares…

A Chevron-chartered oil tanker that was seized by Iran more than a year ago was heading for international waters on Thursday, LSEG ship tracking data showed.The Marshall Islands-flagged Advantage Sweet was boarded by Iran's military in the Gulf of Oman in April 2023 after an alleged collision with an Iranian boat.There was no immediate comment from Chevron or Iranian officials on Thursday on whether the vessel had been released or what discussions may have been involved.The movement…

Freight rates to ship Russian oil have fallen this month towards parity with those for other global exporters for the first time since 2022 as more tankers were available despite Western sanctions and exports fell, three sources said on Wednesday.Freight rates to ship Russian oil soared to more than $20 million per voyage in 2022 after the West imposed sanctions and a $60 dollar price cap to try to limit Russian export revenues.The sources who asked not to be named because they…

Seattle-headquartered Saltchuk on Wednesday announced it has completed its acquisition of Overseas Shipholding Group (OSG), a New York-listed marine transportation company based in Tampa, Fla.Privately-held Saltchuk—previously OSG’s largest shareholder—said it completed a $950 million transaction to purchase all outstanding shares of OSG common stock at $8.50 per share in cash, making OSG a wholly owned subsidiary. OSG common stock is now delisted and deregistered from the from New York Stock Exchange.OSG…

Oil and shipping group Monjasa on Wednesday announced it has added two secondhand tankers to its owned fleet, in a move that targets growth in West Africa’s offshore industry.The vessels are the 17,200 DWT Monjasa Rover (formerly Fure Nord) and 7,858 DWT Monjasa Hunter (formerly Annelise Theresa), the latter of which joins as a unique fleet addition targeting length-restricted offshore oil and gas vessels in West Africa, including FPSOs, Monjasa said.According to Monjasa, the…

The Texas energy industry was evaluating the impact from Hurricane Beryl on Monday after the powerful storm lashed the U.S. Gulf Coast, closing key shipping ports and hitting the oil refining and production sectors.Beryl made landfall near the coastal town of Matagorda, Texas, on Monday morning, packing maximum sustained winds of 80 miles per hour (129 kilometers an hour) and posing problems for the heart of the country's energy sector.The storm had strengthened to a Category…

Brazilian logistics firm Transpetro, a subsidiary of state-run oil firm Petrobras, has launched a procurement notice to commission four new coastal vessels, Transpetro's chief executive announced on Monday.The four vessels would be of the 'handy' class with a capacity of 15,000 to 18,000 deadweight tonnage, Transpetro CEO Sergio Bacci said at an event on Monday in Rio de Janeiro.Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is pushing Petrobras to help strengthen the country's naval industry, which he sees as key to job creation, after it lost relevance over the past decade due to corruption s

Product and chemical tanker shipping company Ardmore Shipping Corporation on Monday announced that its current senior vice president and chief commercial officer Gernot Ruppelt will succeed company founder Anthony Gurnee as CEO.Gurnee will retire on September 16, 2024, at which point Ruppelt will step into the CEO position and current CFO Bart Kelleher will take on the additional role of president. Ruppelt will maintain responsibility for Ardmore's commercial platform, and Kelleher will maintain his role as CFO until successors are named for the positions.

Malte Willer has been appointed as the successor Jan Eghøj as head of European short-sea shipping company E&S Tankers, the company announced.The handover process will be completed by mid-August when Eghoej will leave the company and Willer will take over as managing director. Willer brings to the role a strong knowledge of the European chemical tanker market, E&S Tankers said.The company also revealed that Christian Vang will take up the role of commercial director, heading the chartering department.

An abandoned tanker that was drifting off Yemen's coast in June has disappeared and is believed to have sunk, three navy and security sources said, the latest vessel lost in the strategically important Red Sea.The area, on the main shipping route from Europe to Asia, is considered high risk as Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthi militants have launched more than 70 attacks on merchant vessels since October in what they say is solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.Maritime security sources said last week the abandoned tanker, the Lavant, was unlikely however to have been targeted by the Houthis.

The Oil Companies International Marine Forum (OCIMF) has confirmed that its digitalized Ship Inspection Report Program (SIRE 2.0) is scheduled to ‘go-live’ on Monday 2 September 2024 and become the standard tanker inspection tool for the marine industry.The final transition to SIRE 2.0 and the withdrawal of the option to request a SIRE Vessel Inspection Questionnaire (VIQ7) inspection from Monday 2 September 2024 has been given now that all pre-agreed ‘Critical Success Factors’ for going live have been met and approved by the OCIMF Vessel Inspection Program Steering Group…

U.S. crude oil imports last month rose to a nearly two-year high as refiners scooped up heavy crudes from Canada and Latin America to process into fuels for summer driving season.Imports of crude oil rose to 3.1 million barrels per day (bpd) in May, the highest since July 2022, data from ship tracking service Kpler showed. Imports so far this month have remained strong, at around 2.9 million bpd to date.Fuel demand has remained tepid with product supplied for gasoline at 9.1 million bpd in the week to June 14, slightly below the 10-year seasonal average, data from the U.S.

A ship operated by Russian shipping group Sovcomflot rescued the crew of a tanker taking in water off Yemen's coast this week, the state-owned company, which is under Western sanctions, said on Wednesday.Sovcomflot tanker NS Africa was sailing southeast of the port of Nishtun in southern Yemen on June 23 when it responded to a distress call by the Lavant tanker whose crew had abandoned ship and were in a life raft in the open sea."At 1410 local time, the crew of the tanker NS Africa ...

Venezuela's state oil company PDVSA has begun using tankers that navigate off radar to supply its closest political ally, Cuba, as a fleet of state-owned vessels that have historically covered the route dwindles, according to documents and ship monitoring services.Cuba and its main oil supplier, Venezuela, for over a decade had exclusively used their own tankers to navigate between the two countries.Delayed maintenance, however, has taken some ships out of service and the emergence…

Sanctions on shipping companies are undermining safety at sea and pose dangers for trade as ship standards are impacted, the chief executive of sanctioned Russian shipping group Sovcomflot said.The European Union imposed sanctions on Russia's state-owned and top tanker company Sovcomflot (SCF) and its CEO Igor Tonkovidov, according to the measures published in the EU's Official Journal on Monday.Earlier this year, the U.S.

The first liquefied natural gas (LNG) tanker since January is sailing through the Red Sea, just days after Yemen-based Houthi militants sank their second vessel in attacks begun last November.The vessel, Asya Energy, passed Yemen, travelling through the Bab al-Mandab Strait on Tuesday, shiptracking data from LSEG and Kpler showed, the same week that the second ship believed to have been hit by the militants sank."Asya Energy is the first LNG tanker to sail through the Strait since January…

As the new SIRE 2.0 inspection regime prepares for its official launch in the third quarter of 2024, the tanker industry is bracing for significant change. The updated digitized program is expected to increase the number of inspection findings, even for companies with historically strong performance, according to Fabian Fussek, Co-Founder and CEO of mobile-first ship inspection technology company Kaiko Systems.SIRE 2.0 places a much greater emphasis on Human Factors, acknowledging that their performance and knowledge are crucial for the overall efficiency and safety of vessels…

U.S. shipping company Overseas Shipholding Group (OSG) has set out to design a new vessel that will transport liquified carbon dioxide (LCO2).In April, the Tampa, Fla.-based company was awarded a $3 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy for engineering and design work in support of the project. The award will be used to develop the design of an articulated tug and barge unit (ATB) to be used to transport CO2 captured by emitters in the Greater Tampa Bay region and across…

Denmark is considering ways to stop a so-called shadow fleet of tankers from carrying Russian oil through the Baltic Sea, the Nordic country said on Monday, triggering a sharp response from Moscow's diplomats who said any such move would be unacceptable.Russia sends about a third of its seaborne oil exports, or 1.5% of global supply, through the Danish straits that sit as a gateway to the Baltic Sea, so any attempt to halt supplies could send oil prices higher and hit the Kremlin's finances.Since Western nations imposed a price cap on Russia's oil in an attempt to curb vital funds for its war

Russian oil exporters are charging more for their oil in major market India than at any time since the war in Ukraine started as a growing number of shippers and intermediaries take part in the trade, weakening the impact of Western sanctions on Moscow.The exporters have had to offer deep discounts to encourage shipping companies and traders to move their crude and brave the risk of sanctions since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.Among the restrictions…

The European Union is proposing to sanction Russia's oil-shipping giant Sovcomflot in a move to limit the Kremlin's ability to finance its war against Ukraine, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday, citing a document seen by it.The move would follow similar punitive measure imposed on the leading Russian tanker group early in 2024 by the U.S., with Washington pushing to tighten the screws on Moscow for its war in Ukraine that Russia started in 2022.In a rare admission from a major Russian business of the damage western restrictions against Moscow are having…