{"id":64437,"date":"2026-04-13T01:25:33","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T01:25:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/64437\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T01:25:33","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T01:25:33","slug":"two-supertankers-u-turn-in-hormuz-as-us-iran-talks-break-down-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/64437\/","title":{"rendered":"Two supertankers U-turn in Hormuz as US-Iran talks break down"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\" <\/p>\n

A third VLCC, Mombasa B, was sailing ahead and made its way between Larak and Qeshm islands, an Iran-approved route into the Persian Gulf. It is not currently signaling a clear destination.<\/p>\n

(April 12):\u00a0Two empty supertankers attempted to make their way through the Strait of Hormuz and into the Persian Gulf on Sunday, only to make a last-minute U-turn just as peace negotiations between the US and Iran broke down, threatening a fragile ceasefire.<\/p>\n

A trio of very large crude carriers (VLCC)\u00a0\u2014 all without direct links to Iran \u2014 began to approach the narrow waterway from the Gulf of Oman late on Saturday, ship-tracking data show, arriving near Iran\u2019s Larak island early on Sunday. At that effective checkpoint, Iraq-bound Agios Fanourios I and Pakistan-flagged Shalamar, destined for Das island in the United Arab Emirates, turned back.<\/p>\n

A third VLCC, Mombasa B, was sailing ahead and made its way between Larak and Qeshm islands, an Iran-approved route into the Persian Gulf. It is not currently signaling a clear destination.<\/p>\n

The specific reasons behind the about-turns \u2014 and the third, successful passage \u2014 are not clear, as both Iraq and Pakistan had earlier received approvals from Iran to transit the strait. But their change of heart came just as negotiators in Islamabad announced they had failed to\u00a0reach a deal.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a> <\/p>\n

The Agios Fanourios I (in white) and Shalamar (blue) u-turned at the mouth of the Strait of Hormuz as the US said they failed to reach an agreement with Iran. Mombasa B (formerly Front Forth, in red) managed to sail through.<\/p>\n

The Strait of Hormuz is one of the world\u2019s most important energy thoroughfares and its effective closure since the US and Israel began strikes on Iran six weeks ago has resulted in unprecedented supply disruption. Its reopening has been a crucial point of discussion during weekend negotiations, but remains an area of\u00a0disagreement.<\/p>\n

In recent weeks, several ships have attempted to transit the strait only to abort their efforts, reflecting a constantly changing security situation and persistently high risks. The vast majority have been attempting to leave the Persian Gulf, but empty tankers are also needed inside, to be loaded with new cargoes.<\/p>\n

Two Chinese container ships\u00a0U-turned\u00a0late last month before finally successfully exiting, while a liquefied natural gas carrier\u00a0turned back\u00a0last week.<\/p>\n

A successful exit by all three ships on Sunday would have continued a positive uptick in transits through the waterway, controlled by Iran and dominated by Iran-linked vessels since the end of February. On Saturday, two Chinese supertankers and a Greek vessel\u00a0exited\u00a0the gulf via Hormuz, laden with crude.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A third VLCC, Mombasa B, was sailing ahead and made its way between Larak and Qeshm islands, an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64438,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[24279,34,13179,39,101,6253],"class_list":{"0":"post-64437","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-persian-gulf","8":"tag-agios-fanourios","9":"tag-iran","10":"tag-larak-island","11":"tag-persian-gulf","12":"tag-strait-of-hormuz","13":"tag-vlcc"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116394795047070586","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64437","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64437"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64437\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64438"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}