This is the moment a pair of oil tankers were consumed by an inferno after they were struck by explosive-laden suicide boats sent by Iran as they sat in Gulf waters.
Footage of Iran’s devastating attack showed a massive fireball quickly expand as flames rapidly consumed the vessels.
A faint outline of a ship can be seen, lit red by the growing fire, as clouds of black smoke billow into the night sky.
The oil fire continues to swell as more of the vessel is set ablaze, with flames reaching hundreds of feet into the air in a short time.
This morning, on the 13th day of the brutal war in the Middle East, unrelenting Iranian attacks pushed the price of Brent crude once again to just over $100 per barrel, days after it peaked near $120.
Iran appears to be sticking to its threat of pushing the price of oil to record levels by continuing to aggressively target commercial and military ships in the Gulf.
A spokesperson for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) warned last night that any vessel linked to the US, Israel or its allies seen in the Gulf would be targeted.
They added in comments apparently directed at the US: ‘You will not be able to artificially lower the price of oil. Expect oil at $200 per barrel.
‘The price of oil depends on regional security, and you are the main source of insecurity in the region.’
The ships Iran targeted in late-night attacks on Wednesday in the Gulf near Iraq were the Marshall Islands-flagged Safesea Vishnu and the Zefyros, which had loaded fuel cargoes in Iraq, two Iraqi port officials told the Reuters news agency.
This is the moment Iraqi oil tankers erupt into flames after being struck by explosive-filled Iranian boats
Footage has now been released of the Iranian strike and sees a huge orange flash in the middle of the water, followed by rapidly spreading flames
One official said the Zefyros was a Malta-flagged ship.
The Iranian attack saw one crew member killed and triggered a rapid response from Iraqi authorities. It is not currently known which ship the man worked on.
Officials rushed to the scene to evacuate crews from the ships as flames engulfed the area.
The vessels were working within Iraqi territorial waters at the time of the strike, according to the country’s director general of the General Company for Ports, Farhan al-Fartousi.
He said: ‘Two foreign tankers carrying Iraqi fuel oil were subjected to unidentified attacks inside territorial waters, causing them to catch fire.’
All oil ports have ‘completely stopped operations’ in the wake of the attack, Iraqi officials announced, but commercial ports will keep working as normal.
Iran also attacked Bahrain’s Muharraq Island – home to Bahrain’s International Airport.
Bahrain’s Interior Ministry urged locals ‘to remain in their homes, close windows and ventilation openings, as a precautionary measure against possible exposure to smoke from the ongoing fire being combated’.
A video has emerged online showing smoke near the major airport as droves of travellers can be seen rushing towards the doors. The government department described the fire as impacting oil tanks in the vicinity.
In Israel, 179 people are said to have been injured in the last 24 hours by the war, bringing the total number of people injured since the beginning of the conflict to 2,745, the nation’s health ministry said.
In Dubai, authorities said they were ‘responding to a minor drone incident in the Al Bada’a area’.
No injuries have been reported so far amid reports of loud explosions in the city, which was once a British holiday hotspot.
Kuwait International Airport has been hit by a number of drones, the country’s news agency has reported.
Their reports, citing the civil aviation authorities as a source, said the strike caused ‘material damage only’.
The attacks on its Gulf neighbour comes after Iran flouted a UN Security Council resolution from the previous day demanding that it halt strikes on its Gulf enemies, with new attacks also reported in Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates.
Authorities are meanwhile searching for three missing crew members from the Mayuree Naree, pictured, after 20 were rescued by the Omani navy
Sirens wailed before dawn in Jerusalem as Israel intercepted incoming Iranian missiles, and loud booms were heard later in the day in another attack on the city.
Israel launched a ‘wide-scale wave of strikes’ on Tehran and in Lebanon, where Israel says it is targeting Iran-linked Hezbollah militants, 11 people were killed in two early morning strikes.
Since the United States and Israel started the war with a February 28 attack on Iran, Tehran has focused on inflicting enough global economic pain to pressure them to halt their attacks.
Donald Trump suggested that was not imminent, however, promising to ‘finish the job’ even though he claimed Iran is ‘virtually destroyed.’
‘We don’t want to leave early do we? We’ve got to finish the job,’ he said at an event on Wednesday in Kentucky.
He claimed that he would make the price of oil come back down, telling supporters at the rally: ‘Prices are coming down very substantially. Oil will be coming down. that’s just a matter of war that happens.
‘You can almost predict it. I would say it went up a little bit less than we thought. It’s going to come down more than anyone understands.’
He also vowed to protect the Strait of Hormuz, insisting the world is ‘going to see great safety and it is going to be very, very quickly’.
Iran has all but cut off access to the waterway, a chokepoint in global trade that ordinarily sees around 20 per cent of all oil pass through daily.
Since the start of the war in the Middle East, however, it has established a domineering presence in the Strait.
Ebrahim Zolfaqari, spokesperson for Iran’s military command said in comments directed at the US and its allies: ‘Get ready for oil be $200 a barrel, because the oil price depends on regional security which you have destabilised.’
On Tuesday, Iran said it would not allow ‘one litre of oil’ to be shipped from the Middle East if US and Israeli attacks continue.
An attack on the Thailand-flagged bulk carrier Mayuree Naree from an ‘unknown projectile’, which was reported at 4.35am GMT, happened 11 nautical miles north of Oman and resulted in a fire onboard the ship.
Authorities are searching for three missing crew members from the Mayuree Naree after 20 were rescued by the Omani navy.
Earlier, the Japan-flagged container ship One Majesty had sustained minor damage from an unknown projectile 25 nautical miles northwest of Ras Al Khaimah in the United Arab Emirates, two maritime security sources said.
Its crew members are safe and the vessel is sailing towards a safe anchorage, the sources added.
A third vessel, a bulk carrier, was also hit by an unknown projectile approximately 50 miles northwest of Dubai, maritime security firms said.
Iran today confirmed it had attacked the ships, adding: ‘The American aggressors and their partners have no right to pass.’
The projectile had damaged the hull of the Marshall Islands-flagged Star Gwyneth, maritime risk management company Vanguard said, adding that the vessel’s crew were safe.
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Saudi Arabia’s state oil company warned earlier this week of ‘catastrophic consequences’ for the world’s oil markets if the Middle East war continues to choke exports.
Amin Nasser, the CEO of Aramco, said: ‘While we have faced disruptions in the past, this one by far is the biggest crisis the region’s oil and gas industry has faced.’
He admitted that while his firm, the world’s single biggest exporter of oil, was meeting most of its customers’ needs for now, this was only possible by tapping into storage facilities outside the Gulf.
Nasser said that these stores cannot be used for ‘an extended period of time, but for the time being, we are capitalising on it.’
The CEO said: ‘There would be catastrophic consequences for the world’s oil markets, and the longer the disruption goes on … the more drastic the consequences for the global economy.’
