Gulf attacks reach the northern Gulf as talks produce a draft
Tracker Red Sea and Hormuz: are ships going through? · 7.3 ships/day
A strike off Saudi Arabia’s northern coast puts Upper Gulf feeders in the firing line
A tanker sailing southeast through the Gulf was hit on its port side by two unidentified projectiles at 2347 UTC on 1 November. It was about 72 nautical miles east of Ras Al Khafji, the Saudi town on the Kuwaiti border. That was just before 3am local time on 2 November. UKMTO (UK Maritime Trade Operations, the British navy’s reporting centre for merchant ships) said all crew were accounted for and no environmental damage was reported. It did not name the ship or say how badly it was damaged.
Shipping through the Strait of Hormuz has been badly restricted for months, and commercial traffic is still well below prewar levels, according to gCaptain. Most recent attacks have been at or near the strait itself. This one was not.
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Why this strike is different
Our view: the northern Gulf attack is the most important shipping fact of the past few days, more important than the draft peace proposal that moved oil prices on Monday.
Here is why. Until now, the main question for Gulf cargo was how to get through Hormuz. The US has been running facilitated transits, which help ships get through the strait. But a strike 72 miles off Ras Al Khafji happens hundreds of miles beyond the strait, in waters that ships bound for Kuwait, Iraq and northern Saudi Arabia have to cross. Getting through the strait safely no longer means the risky part of the voyage is over.
That changes the maths for anyone moving boxes to the Upper Gulf, meaning the ports north and west of Hormuz such as Dammam, Kuwait’s ports and Umm Qasr in Iraq.
What happened on 1 November
The Ras Al Khafji strike was one of several incidents in about 24 hours.
At 1509 UTC on 1 November, the master of a merchant ship reported receiving a Mayday call on VHF Channel 16, the international distress radio channel, from another vessel that had reportedly been struck. UKMTO said that ship was hit by “an unknown projectile” in the Strait of Hormuz, according to gCaptain and Arab News. UKMTO issued Warning 191-26 for the incident, gCaptain reported. Its identity, damage and crew condition are still unknown.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) navy then said two oil tankers had “exploded” after hitting mines while using an “unauthorized route” in the strait, according to Iranian state media as reported by Arab News. The tankers were not named. No maritime authority has confirmed the claim. Treat it as a claim, not a fact. But note the message: JMIC says the IRGC is pressing merchant ships to use Iranian-controlled transit routes, and this claim tells owners that routes Iran has not approved carry a cost.
The days before were just as busy. The Joint Maritime Information Center (JMIC), a naval-led body that advises merchant shipping in the region, listed these in its 1 November advisory, as summarised by gCaptain: - The very large crude carrier ARZANAH was hit by a projectile on 28 October while leaving through the strait. - The Panama-flagged tanker RITI was struck on 29 October near Khasab, Oman, and lost propulsion. Oman’s navy evacuated 25 crew. - The tanker LOUISE 1 was attacked on 29 October about 25 nautical miles northeast of Khasab. A small boat attached two explosive devices above the waterline. - The Qatari LNG carrier AL MAYEDA was struck on 30 October about 40 nautical miles south of Iran’s Lavan Island, causing a fire.
Almost all of these were near Khasab and the Musandam Peninsula at the strait’s mouth, or in the lower Gulf. The Ras Al Khafji strike is far north of that cluster.
JMIC counts 18 confirmed attacks in the strait since 6 October. That count was made before the two newest UKMTO warnings. JMIC keeps its threat assessment at SEVERE and says further deliberate attacks are “highly likely”.
UKMTO advised ships to transit the Ras Al Khafji area with caution and report anything suspicious, Logistics Middle East reported.
Talks are moving, ships are not
The diplomatic news was better. Qatar-mediated talks went into a third day on Sunday 1 November, CBS News reported. An official briefed on the talks told Reuters that a draft proposal is circulating and a follow-up meeting is possible. Iran’s foreign minister, Abbas Araqchi, called the talks “ongoing and progressing”, Reuters said.
Oil reacted fast. By 1020 GMT on 2 November, Brent crude was down $4.79, or 4.2%, at $108.64 a barrel, according to Reuters. US crude was down 4.2% at $99.71. “The new month brought with it renewed hopes of a breakthrough in the Iranian stalemate,” said Tamas Varga of oil broker PVM.
But the risk has not gone away. On Sunday, President Trump repeated that he may have to give Tehran “the hammer” at some point, CBS reported. He has signalled he may restart strikes once the US midterm elections are over. Those are on Tuesday 3 November. In Bahrain, UAE presidential adviser Anwar Gargash said: “We don’t really want to see another round of confrontation in the region.”
Our view: a 4% drop in oil is a market betting on a deal. It is not a carrier deciding to send ships back in. Container lines need insurers to cover the voyage, crews willing to sail, and weeks of calm before they commit to a weekly timetable. None of those exists today. About 490 vessels were waiting outside the strait on 1 November, and there were 119 US-facilitated transits from 29 to 31 October, roughly 40 a day, according to gCaptain. Commercial traffic is still well below prewar levels.
What this means for forwarders and shippers
The workarounds carriers built this year all assumed the inside of the Gulf was safer than the strait. The northern strike tests that.
Hapag-Lloyd reopened bookings to Kuwait, Dammam, Qatar, Iraq and the UAE using third-party feeders (smaller ships that shuttle boxes from a hub port) out of Sharjah. Its own notice warns: “Feeder rotations do not operate on a fixed weekly schedule and remain subject to transit safety conditions in the region.”
In May, MSC announced a service from Europe through Suez to Jeddah and King Abdullah on the Red Sea, with a first sailing set for 10 May. Trucks then carry boxes about 1,300 km across Saudi Arabia to Dammam. From Dammam, feeders reach Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Abu Dhabi and Jebel Ali, Bloomberg reported via swissinfo. The Ras Al Khafji strike sits in the stretch of water those Dammam feeders cross to reach Kuwait and Iraq.
Cost is already high. In April, Lockton India’s Darshan Parikh told Indian Transport & Logistics News that war-risk premiums, the extra insurance paid to sail in a war zone, for Hormuz voyages had surged by 200–300%. The same article put premiums for tankers and other vessels at around 3–5% of a ship’s value, up from about 0.2–0.5% before the conflict. Freightos’ Judah Levine said a Shanghai to Jebel Ali container cost roughly $1,800 in January and more than $7,000 by late March.
Here is what we expect forwarders to see: - Surcharges spread north. War-risk and emergency surcharges for Kuwait, Iraq and northern Saudi cargo are unlikely to fall while ships are being hit inside the Gulf. Quote these lanes with surcharges included, and keep quote validity short. - Longer, looser schedules. Feeders out of Dammam and Sharjah may pause or reroute after each attack. Build buffer days into delivery promises, especially for reefer and time-sensitive cargo. - Jeddah and trucking stay important. Red Sea ports plus the Saudi land bridge are the most predictable option for many Upper Gulf shipments, even at higher cost. Check trucking capacity on the Jeddah to Riyadh to Dammam corridor before committing volume. - Fuel surcharges swing both ways. Bunker and jet fuel prices follow crude. If talks hold, lower oil will feed into BAF (bunker adjustment factor, the fuel surcharge on ocean freight) and air fuel surcharges with a lag. If talks fail after the midterms, the reverse. Expect November surcharge notices to move in both directions. - Watch the inside of the Gulf, not just the strait. One more strike north of Bahrain would tell you the Ras Al Khafji attack was not a one-off.
Our prediction
The draft proposal is real progress, and a deal could come quickly. But even a signed deal would need weeks of quiet before insurers and carriers trust the route again. Ships are still being hit, now hundreds of miles inside the Gulf, and JMIC expects more.
Our prediction: no major carrier restores a regular scheduled container service through Hormuz into the Upper Gulf before 1 December 2026. The northern Gulf strike makes that call firmer, not weaker.
Sources
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