Red Sea clearance by email. Marine Insight reports that shipping companies are advising captains to seek passage clearance from the Humanitarian Operations Coordination Center, a body the Houthis set up in 2024, since the group’s declared ban on traffic to and from Saudi Arabian ports, with replies typically coming within 24 hours. In one case it describes, the captain of a Chinese container ship pledged that the vessel was Chinese owned, managed and crewed with no links to the United States, the United Kingdom or Israel, and was cleared to sail the Red Sea, Bab el Mandeb, Gulf of Aden and Arabian Sea on conditions including keeping AIS and VHF channel 16 active at all times. International maritime organisations say the mechanism is not legal and ships should not seek Houthi permission.
UAE rescue in the Gulf of Oman. The UAE National Guard said on November 8 that it rescued all 22 crew of a cargo ship that caught fire in the Gulf of Oman, after the crew reported the fire, and that all 22, Arab nationals, are in stable condition. The Guard did not name the ship or its flag or give a cause. UKMTO had received a report on Saturday of an incident involving a bulk carrier and military forces east of Khor Fakkan, and it is not clear whether that incident is linked to the fire.
Remains found on a Black Sea tanker. Bulgarian prosecutors in Varna said severely damaged human remains were found during debris clearing aboard a San Marino flagged chemical tanker under repair in Bulgaria that matches the Wine Trader, and ordered DNA tests, without naming the ship. Of the Wine Trader’s 12 crew, seven went missing and five were pulled out alive after the October 15 attack about 24 kilometres southeast of Sulina, and AFP reported at least nine merchant ships have come under drone attacks off Romania and Bulgaria since early October, leaving 34 people dead or missing.
Ghana petrol relief in prospect. The Chamber of Petroleum Consumers told Citi FM on November 5 that crude had fallen 12 to 14 percent in 48 hours since the US midterm elections and that petrol prices are likely to fall in Ghana’s second November pricing window, which begins November 16 and is calculated on average prices from October 27 to November 11. In the current window Star Oil sells petrol at 16.38 cedis a litre and diesel at 18.45 cedis, against National Petroleum Authority floors of 15.39 and 17.41 cedis, and the authority’s chief executive said the government has absorbed a little over 2 billion cedis to shield consumers from higher world prices.
Finland plans a full icebreaker renewal. A Finnish Transport Infrastructure Agency programme for 2026 to 2045 proposes replacing the fleet progressively, starting with the 1970s built Urho and Sisu, then Kontio and Otso in the 2030s and Fennica and Nordica in the 2040s, concluding Finland will need at least as many icebreakers as today despite warming winters, because ice conditions become more variable and newer merchant ships are less capable in ice. More than 95 percent of Finland’s foreign trade in goods moves by sea, and the report proposes exploring a common replacement design and joint procurement with Sweden.