Maritime Security and Safety
147 Ships and Counting: Ukraine’s Drone Fleet Rewrites the Rules of Maritime Warfare
147 Ships and Counting: Ukraine’s Drone Fleet Rewrites the Rules of Maritime Warfare
Eleven days. Two seas. 147 vessels struck. Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces have turned commercial shipping lanes in the Sea of Azov and Black Sea into a live-fire economic battlefield, and the implications reach far beyond the war itself, straight into the heart of how the world polices attacks on merchant shipping.
By Oghenewoke Osaweren | Waterways News
Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces (USF) reported Thursday that 147 Russian-linked vessels have been struck between July 6 and July 16 under Operation “MoLoChKa.” Eleven more ships were hit overnight on July 16 alone. Of the total, 117 vessels were targeted in the Sea of Azov and 30 in the Black Sea, after commander Robert “Madyar” Brovdi declared the Azov phase over and shifted operations into the Black Sea on July 15, framing it as a new front timed to Ukrainian Statehood Day.
The latest haul included five oil tankers, one gas tanker, three dry cargo vessels, and two tugboats. In the opening night of the Black Sea push, USF drones reportedly hit 17 oil tankers, two gas tankers, and one tugboat in a single overnight raid.
Ukrainian officials describe the campaign as calibrated warfare against logistics, not theatrics. Brovdi has said operators strike vessels without sinking them outright, leaving them disabled and adrift, with the stated goal of wearing down Russia’s sanctions-evading “shadow fleet” until it effectively ceases to function. The economic logic behind the strategy: a single large export tanker requires roughly a dozen smaller vessels to fill it, and Ukraine has concentrated its strikes on those smaller ships.
The pressure is already reshaping trade patterns. Russia has suspended traffic through the Azov-Don Canal and halted new applications for Kerch Strait passage, a disruption that could cost the country up to a fifth of its grain exports, forcing regional export authorities to scramble for alternative routes.
Moscow has branded the campaign an act of terrorism against civilian shipping. Kyiv rejects that framing outright, insisting it targets only vessels tied to Russia’s military logistics and sanctions evasion-vessels it argues have deliberately obscured their ownership to keep moving.
The International Maritime Organization has not stayed silent. IMO Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez has condemned the strikes on merchant shipping in both seas, warning that ordinary seafarers must not be treated as acceptable losses in a geopolitical conflict, a caution that lands squarely within the IMO’s core mandate to protect civilian crews regardless of who is right in the underlying dispute.
For maritime administrations and flag registries everywhere, including those overseeing inland and coastal waterways in West Africa, this campaign is a live case study in how quickly “grey zone” shipping, murky vessel ownership, and sanctions evasion can drag commercial fleets into the crossfire of state conflict. Tactics that disable rather than sink, targeting the wheelhouse over the hull, also raise pointed questions for the IMO and flag states about crew protection standards that current conventions were never built to answer.
Neither side has released a verifiable, vessel-by-vessel account of the damage. Ukraine has not identified the individual ships it says were struck, and Russian authorities have disclosed no independent damage assessment, leaving the full scale of the campaign, for now, a claim still awaiting outside verification.
Maritime Security and Safety
IMO Council Mourns Slain Seafarers, Demands Stronger Protection as Maritime Conflicts Deepen
IMO Council Mourns Slain Seafarers, Demands Stronger Protection as Maritime Conflicts Deepen
Dominguez warns merchant ships remain exposed from Hormuz to the Black Sea as 138th Council session ends in London
By Okeoghene Onoriobe | Waterways News
Member states at the International Maritime Organization (IMO) used the opening of the Council’s 138th session to mourn seafarers killed in recent attacks and to demand firmer protection for civilian mariners.
Council met in London from 2 to 6 November, with Russia and Iran putting security in the Black Sea and the Strait of Hormuz at the centre of discussions. On 2 November, Secretary-General Arsenio Dominguez said commercial shipping remained exposed to attack in the Strait of Hormuz, the Red Sea, Bab el-Mandeb, the Eastern Mediterranean, the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov.
The mourning was driven by a run of deaths this year. Five seafarers reportedly died on 29 September during the rescue of the hijacked HONOUR 25 in Somali waters, and several others were seriously injured. In all, 44 seafarers were freed from three vessels. Dominguez noted that 22 seafarers remain captive aboard the ASANA, which was seized earlier this year, and urged continued effort to secure their release.
The Strait of Hormuz remains the deadliest flashpoint. The IMO had verified at least 70 attacks on international shipping there, with 19 seafarers killed, by its late-August assessment. A tally reported by gCaptain put the seafarer death toll at 24 as of 5 November.
Dominguez has repeatedly insisted that seafarers are civilians doing their jobs. He has said they should never become casualties of conflicts to which they are not a party.
Member states echoed the call. Liberia renewed its appeal for seafarer protection and freedom of navigation, and Indonesia said seafarer protection and safety of navigation must be a shared priority.
The session also dealt with leadership. Council backed a second four-year term for Dominguez, subject to approval by the IMO Assembly in 2027. The term would run from 1 January 2028 to 31 December 2031.
Nigeria Watch
Nigeria has more at stake than a distant diplomatic debate. Hormuz disruption has fed through to freight rates, war-risk insurance and port costs for Nigerian importers and shippers. Piracy off Somalia and the Gulf of Aden is a reminder that the Gulf of Guinea’s own security gains, including the Deep Blue Project, cannot be taken for granted.
The Council session also bears on Nigeria’s IMO seat. Abuja has pushed seafarer welfare and maritime security as part of its diplomacy, and the Council’s message gives that agenda more weight. The test is whether Nigeria backs its advocacy abroad with welfare protections, training and safety enforcement for its own mariners and for the informal waterway operators represented by WABOTAN and ATBOWATON.
For those operators, the lesson from London is that protection is a shared responsibility, and it has to reach the people who work on the inland water, not just those on ocean-going ships.
Nigeria Unveils Home-Built ADX-Barra 200 Autonomous Vessel at AFRIDEX 2026
Arridex, DICON joint venture Helagon delivers country’s first indigenously developed unmanned surface vessels%
By Ighoyota Onaibre | Waterways News
Nigeria has unveiled its first indigenously developed autonomous surface vessel, the ADX-Barra 200. Arridex Group, formerly RusselSmith Group, built it through Helagon, its defence joint venture with the Defence Industries Corporation of Nigeria (DICON).
The vessel was unveiled on 26 October at the inaugural Africa International Defence Exhibition (AFRIDEX 2026) at Eko Atlantic, Lagos. The exhibition ran from 26 to 29 October.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu was represented by Senate President Godswill Akpabio. He said the administration prioritises defence industry growth because a nation is more secure when it can build and maintain its own capability. He described the vessel as that capability taking shape, designed and built by local engineers in partnership with DICON, and said it deserves government support and the confidence of the armed forces.
ADX-Barra 200
Arridex Group CEO Kayode Adeleke presented the vessel. He said Helagon was set up to design autonomous systems and that the ADX-Barra 200 is the result. For the forces that will use it, he called it a force multiplier.
The ADX-Barra 200 is one of two platforms in the ADX-Barra series launched at the exhibition. The other is the ADX-Barra 100. Arridex says both were designed, built and integrated in Nigeria by its engineers.
Adeleke tied the platforms to Gulf of Guinea security. He said the region’s waters carry its trade, support its coastal communities and hold much of its energy wealth, and that protecting them calls for capability the region can build, sustain and improve itself. He invited the armed services and other stakeholders to arrange demonstrations and to help shape later generations of the vessels.
Others at the unveiling included Lagos State Deputy Governor Dr Obafemi Hamzat and the Minister of State for Defence, Dr Bello Matawalle. DICON Director-General Major General Babatunde Ibrahim Alaya, Helagon Chief Operating Officer Engr. Precious Omo-Agege and Arridex senior management were also present.
Arridex has not published the vessel’s technical specifications, including its length, endurance, payload and sensors. Both vessels remained on display at the exhibition.
NIGERIA WATCH
A home-built answer to a long-standing maritime problem: Nigeria’s waters have long needed more patrol capacity than its platforms and budgets can supply. A locally designed vessel that “can be supported, adapted and improved by the team that made it,” as Arridex puts it, addresses one persistent weakness. Imported hulls and systems often sit idle for want of spares, support and trained hands.
The questions that matter next: Unveilings are not deployments. The Navy, NIMASA’s Deep Blue Project and other agencies will want to know the vessel’s range, endurance, sensors and sea-state limits. They will also want to know whether it can work in the Gulf of Guinea. Until Arridex publishes specifications and arranges trials, the “game-changing” claim remains the company’s own.
Beyond defence: Waterways News readers should watch whether this technology filters into civil uses such as inland waterway surveillance, anti-vandalism patrols and search and rescue. The country’s inland operators, including those represented by WABOTAN and ATBOWATON, face insecurity and safety gaps that policy announcements have not closed. Local manufacturing capacity matters to them only if it eventually reaches the waterways where they work.
The accountability test: The industrial-policy argument is sound. It is build locally and maintain locally. It will be judged by procurement, deployment and sustained operation, not by launch-day speeches.
Editor's Choice
Australia Bars Repeat-Offender Bulk Carrier for 90 Days Over Falsified Crew Rest Records
Australia Bars Repeat-Offender Bulk Carrier for 90 Days Over Falsified Crew Rest Records
By Okeoghene Onoriobe | Waterways News
Australian maritime authorities have banned the Marshall Islands-flagged bulk carrier Wooyang Venus from its ports and waters for 90 days. Inspectors found that the ship’s crew work and rest-hour records had been deliberately falsified to hide excessive working hours.
The Australian Maritime Safety Authority (AMSA) boarded the vessel at the Port of Newcastle on 29 October after a complaint under the Maritime Labour Convention (MLC). Its port state control inspection found that the records did not match the hours the crew actually worked. The ship left Newcastle on 31 October for Korea, and the ban took effect afterwards.
This is the vessel’s third brush with Australian enforcement in under three years. AMSA detained it in August 2026 when crew hours were neither properly recorded nor monitored. It was first detained in December 2023, after a complaint from the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF).
That inspection found falsified hours records, poor food provisions and an allegation that the master had assaulted a crew member. AMSA’s annual MLC report says the operator then submitted a corrective action plan covering repatriation, better provisions and training on rest-hour compliance. The latest findings suggest those measures did not take hold.
AMSA Executive Director for Maritime Safety and Environmental Compliance, Greg Witherall, said falsifying records meant to protect seafarers undermines both crew welfare and ship safety. He warned that fatigue dulls judgement and slows reaction times, raising the risk of collisions, groundings and injuries, particularly during navigation and watchkeeping.
The ban was imposed under Section 246 of Australia’s Navigation Act 2012. AMSA cited the deliberate falsification, the repeated breaches and doubts over the effectiveness of the owner’s and operator’s safety management systems.
Nigeria Watch
The case matters for Nigeria for three reasons:
Records are the enforcement tool. Fatigue rules only work if rest-hour logs can be trusted. Australia treated falsification as a safety-system failure, not a paperwork lapse, and banned the ship rather than detaining it again.
Repeat offenders need escalating penalties. Two detentions and a corrective plan did not change this operator’s behaviour. Nigerian port state control should ask whether its own follow-up on repeat deficiencies has real consequences.
Seafarer welfare is a Nigerian issue. Nigerian seafarers serve on foreign-flagged ships, and those working boats and ferries on domestic waters face fatigue and welfare gaps too, often with no records at all.
The MLC regime Australia is enforcing shows what accountability looks like. It is the benchmark NIMASA and the inland regulators should be measured against, and one this publication will keep pressing.
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