Maritime Security and Safety
94 Days and Counting: The Strait of Hormuz Remains a Ghost Waterway
94 Days and Counting: The Strait of Hormuz Remains a Ghost Waterway
Global shipping crisis deepens as executives refuse to risk vessels despite Trump’s promises of imminent reopening
By Oghenewoke Osaweren | Waterways News Correspondent, Lagos
The world’s most consequential maritime chokepoint entered its 94th day of near-total paralysis on Monday, with shipping executives gathered in Athens warning that no meaningful resumption of traffic through the Strait of Hormuz is likely until Washington and Tehran reach a durable, enforceable peace agreement.
The stark reality on the water tells its own story. According to research firm Kpler, only seven ships passed through the strait last Friday — five entering and two exiting — while just four additional vessels transited over the weekend. Under normal conditions, approximately 100 cargo-carrying vessels move through the waterway daily.
“Traffic still remains exceptionally depleted,” Matt Smith, Director of Commodity Research at Kpler, told CNN. “Barring a handful of tankers crossing each day, the strait remains essentially closed.”
The World’s Largest Oil Disruption
The International Energy Agency has described the halting of traffic through the Strait of Hormuz as “the largest oil supply disruption in the history” of the global market — bigger even than the oil shocks of the 1970s.
Since the start of the US-Israel war on Iran nine weeks ago, the strait — through which 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas is shipped during peacetime — has become the chokepoint of the global economy, stoking fears of a worldwide recession.
About 2,000 ships currently remain stranded in the Gulf, waiting to be allowed through. Over 22,500 mariners are trapped on more than 1,550 commercial vessels in and around the strait, according to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dan Caine.
Athens Summit: Confidence, Not Convoys, Is the Key
The world’s most powerful shipping executives are convening this week in Athens for the annual Posidonia International Shipping Exhibition. The Strait of Hormuz has dominated every conversation.
President Donald Trump has insisted the strait’s reopening is imminent, with administration officials pointing to the trickle of vessels getting through as evidence of progress. But industry leaders are not persuaded.
Gene Seroka, Executive Director of the Port of Los Angeles — who spent half a decade working for American President Lines in the Middle East — told CNN that sporadic transits are not enough.
“The larger issue is whether carriers, insurers and vessel operators have enough confidence in the long-term security environment to resume regular service patterns,” Seroka said. It will take more than a “limited number of successful transits” to restore that confidence, he added.
Project Freedom’ Falls Short
A US military initiative last month — dubbed “Project Freedom” — sought to escort commercial vessels out of the strait under naval protection. War-risk insurance for tankers now prices at 8.0 times the pre-crisis level, with six P&I clubs withdrawing cover. The initiative proved short-lived.
Despite subsequent reports of renewed naval escorts, a spokesperson for US Central Command contradicted those claims outright.
“Though US forces are not escorting, we continue to communicate and coordinate with commercial ships seeking to freely and safely transit the Strait of Hormuz,” said Captain Tim Hawkins, spokesman for the command.
An oil industry source was blunt in their assessment: “Our general sense is that the threat to ships crossing the Strait is still significant, and we will not see a full resumption of traffic through the strait until there is a stronger guarantee of safe passage.”
Fresh Attack on Monday
Further underscoring the danger, a cargo vessel travelling in the northern Persian Gulf was struck by an unknown projectile on Monday, according to a British military-run maritime security organisation. The US has also said it will take six months to clear mines it believes Iran has laid across the strait. There have now been 39 vessel strikes in the region and 11 deaths recorded since the conflict began, according to the International Maritime Organization (IMO).
Container Giants Trapped; Food Supplies at Risk
The crisis has moved well beyond oil. Container ships that ordinarily deliver food, medicine, and consumer goods to Gulf states are also paralysed. Maersk, one of the world’s largest container shipping firms, has not had a ship depart since mid-May — with six of its vessels still stranded in the Gulf.
Jebel Ali Port in Dubai, the largest container port in the Middle East and a critical transshipment hub for the entire region, is experiencing severe congestion from vessels that have diverted following the closure.
Shipping industry sources are emphatic that when the strait does eventually reopen, no tolls or discriminatory transit fees must be imposed.
Arsenio Dominguez, Secretary General of the IMO, used his address to the Athens conference on Monday to hammer the point home: “As shipping comes under increasing pressure from geopolitical events, we must do all we can to work together to always put the safety of seafarers first. I call on the industry to stand with IMO in defending the principle of freedom of navigation, including the rejection of tolls and discriminatory transit measures.”
Shipping Rates Soar; Recovery Will Take Time
For tanker operators operating outside the Gulf, the crisis has been remarkably profitable. Heidmar, a Greek tanker firm, reported a more than 200% surge in revenue in the first quarter of 2026 compared to the same period last year — a direct consequence of what its CEO, Pankaj Khanna, described as “historically elevated” shipping rates.
Chevron CEO Mike Wirth acknowledged the long road to normalisation. “You need new ships to come back in, and ship owners have to be comfortable sending crews back after being trapped for months,” Wirth told Bloomberg on Friday. “Clearing out inventories to allow oil fields to restart and repair damage won’t happen overnight.”
The waterway’s future status will depend heavily on both the regional security situation and the outcome of ongoing diplomatic efforts between the United States and Iran.
For Nigeria and other African nations that depend on stable oil pricing and global freight networks, the message from Athens is sobering: the world’s most critical maritime corridor remains, for all practical purposes, closed — and no one is prepared to say when it will truly reopen.
EDITOR’S NOTE: The Strait of Hormuz crisis began on March 2, 2026, following joint US-Israeli strikes on Tehran that killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps subsequently declared the strait closed. Waterways.ng will continue to track developments as they affect Nigerian maritime trade and the global energy market.
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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