Khark Island Explosions: Iran Reports Tanker Hit
Iranian media report explosions near Khark Island, the country's main oil terminal, and a possible tanker hit, as the Iran-US conflict continues in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz.
Explosions were heard on Saturday, September 5, near Khark Island in the Persian Gulf, Iran’s main oil terminal, through which ninety percent of the country’s crude exports pass. For Serbia, where pump prices track the price of a barrel on world markets, any fresh incident in that part of the Gulf and in the Strait of Hormuz raises the risk of another price jump, since a significant share of global energy trade still moves through that chokepoint.
Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency said its correspondent heard detonations in the area of the island but that no smoke was visible, leaving open the question of what exactly exploded and where. The Students News Network, citing local sources, offered a sharper version: according to its report, the United States hit an Iranian tanker near the island with a missile. The vessel in question was said to be a small oil tanker, though its identity, the extent of any damage and the origin of the missile remained unconfirmed at the time of writing. Neither side has reported any dead or wounded.
Neither Washington nor Tehran immediately commented on the reported hit. There is no independent confirmation of who fired the missile, no details on the ship’s cargo, and Iranian authorities have not released the tanker’s name.
A War Six Months Old
Fighting between Iran and the United States flared up again last week, after the conflict passed the six month mark. Iran said Thursday its armed forces had struck targets in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, vowing to avenge civilian deaths at a wedding, which Tehran blames on Washington.
The immediate trigger for that retaliation was US strikes near Larak Island, carried out over alleged Iranian mine laying in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran’s missile response came after those US strikes, not before them, despite some reports suggesting the opposite order of events.
The two sides are still competing for control of the Strait of Hormuz: Iran is restricting ship traffic through the waterway, while Washington maintains a counter blockade of Iranian ports. We have previously reported on the scale of that disruption, in a piece on how up to seventeen million barrels of oil pass through Hormuz on an average day, and how on one day only four tankers made it through.
Crude oil prices on world markets have already risen since fighting resumed last week, and every new report of a ship being hit near Khark adds to that uncertainty, even though independent confirmation is still lacking.
Trump and the Island Behind Ninety Percent of Exports
US President Donald Trump has previously threatened to seize Khark Island and take control of Iran’s oil infrastructure. That action was shelved in June amid diplomatic talks, but Saturday’s explosions, whatever their still unconfirmed cause, show how central the terminal remains to the military rivalry between the two countries.
Until Tehran or Washington issues an official statement, reports of a tanker hit near Khark remain unconfirmed. Whether the vessel’s identity and the missile’s origin come to light in the coming days will determine how this episode is remembered within the two countries’ six month war.
