Saudi intercepts 'booby-trapped' boat near Yanbu refinery hub

Dubai — Saudi Arabia has said it intercepted and destroyed a "booby-trapped" boat off the Red Sea port and refining hub of Yanbu on April 27, as attacks targeting the kingdom's energy infrastructure persist.

The incident is the latest attempt in recent weeks to target critical energy infrastructure in Saudi. Yanbu and its port are the location of several petrochemical plants, refineries and product terminals.

Crude prices mostly shrugged off any concerns with front-month Brent trading up about 35 cents at 66/b late on April 27.

The kingdom's Ministry of Defense said an investigation is being carried out to obtain more details about "this hostile act", which involved "a booby-trapped boat."

Shipping sources told S&P Global Platts that this incident took place in the vicinity of a Saudi-owned chemical tanker NCC Dammam.

The ship is operated by Bahri, which is Saudi Arabia's national shipping carrier.

Faisal Al Husseini, the Vice President of VP Commercial and Operations at the Chemicals division of Bahri confirmed with Platts that the ship had not been damaged by the incident.

"We have spoken with the Master of our good vessel NCC Dammam and confirm that the vessel, her crew and cargo are safe and all is well on board," Faisal Al Husseini, the Vice President of commercial and operations at the chemicals division of Bahri told Platts.

The NCC Dammam, was heading to the port of Yanbu, and was carrying a 40,000 mt cargo of chemicals, which it had loaded from the Saudi port of Jubail, data from Platts trade flow tool cFlow showed.

The cFlow data also showed that the NC Dammam was "not under command" on the morning of April 27. This is a status used to describe ships, which through some exceptional circumstance, are unable to maneuver. By April 27 evening local time, the NCC Dammam was again underway.

RISING TENSIONS

The kingdom has come under repeated attack in recent weeks.

In December, an oil products tanker was hit by an explosion while discharging a gasoline cargo at Saudi Arabia's western port of Jeddah. This followed an attack on an Aframax tanker, the Agrari, in November, which was damaged near the Saudi Red Sea port of Al Shuqaiq. There were also several incidents in 2019 involving tankers sailing near the UAE port of Fujairah and the Gulf of Oman.

On April 15, Houthis from Yemen claimed they had launched several ballistic missiles in an attack on Saudi Aramco facilities at the city of Jazan. On April 12, the Houthis targeted Aramco facilities in Jeddah and Jubail in a ballistic missile bombardment. This followed several similar attacks in March aimed at targets on Saudi Arabia's east and west coasts.

Most attacks have been intercepted or missed their intended targets, and have not resulted in significant damage or disruption in production.

PATTERN OF ATTACKS

A September 2019 attack on Saudi Aramco's giant Abqaiq crude processing plant and Khurais oil field, temporarily knocked out 5.7 million b/d -- equal to 5% of global crude demand -- and threw the market briefly into disarray. However, it took just 10 days for Aramco to carry out sufficient repairs for total output to recover to 10 million b/d.

Additionally, in May 2019, the Houthis claimed a drone attack on Saudi Arabia's 5 million b/d East-West pipeline, which runs from Abqaiq in the west to the Red Sea in the east. Repairs to the pipeline are still ongoing.

Most exports of petroleum and natural gas from the Persian Gulf that transit the Suez Canal, or the SUMED pipeline, pass through both the Bab-el-Mandeb and the Strait of Hormuz.

In 2020, around 7 million b/d of crude oil, condensate, and refined petroleum products flowed through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait toward Europe, the US, and Asia, according to cFlow. The Strait of Hormuz, which leads to the Persian Gulf, is also a critical chokepoint through which 30% of the world's seaborne oil passes.