Attacks on Ships in Strait of Hormuz Escalate Sharply

Iran has ramped up attacks on ships in nearby waters, with about as many attacks in the last week as in all of September, raising the risks for ships navigating the Strait of Hormuz.On Wednesday, a container ship, the GFS Pride, sank off the coast of Oman after a strike the day before left it engulfed in flames, according to maritime analysts.Containers were left floating near the attack, according to Pakistan’s National Hydrographic Office, a maritime agency operated by Pakistan’s Navy.Another container ship, the GFS Giselle, was hit by “unknown projectiles” while going through the strait on Wednesday, according to the Maritime and Port Authority of Singapore.

The crew members of both vessels were safe, the statement said, noting that both ships sailed under the Singapore flag.Dimitris Maniatis, the founder of Marisks, a maritime risk management firm, reviewed photos of the incident and said containers were scattered across a wide area of the waterway.“All sorts of people are finding containers and opening them up,” he said.Photos showed people in the area in small boats filled with boxes of goods that had been in the containers.

He said it was not immediately clear whether the United States or Iran had carried out the attack.Iran claimed the vessel hit a naval mine, but maritime analysts said there was no independently verified evidence supporting this claim.The sharp rise in attacks over the last week — at least 15, according to maritime analysts — represented a sea change in risk, even for an industry that had already normalized operating in a much more dangerous environment than before the start of the war nearly eight months ago.

The U.S.response to the increase in Iranian attacks has been muted, though a bulk carrier in the Gulf of Oman was struck by a U.S.

military fighter aircraft on Saturday, according to Marisks.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your pat...