British authorities and naval intelligence sources have reported two incidents that are likely to be the first attacks by the Houthis against merchant ships in the Red Sea in a month.
A separate attack on another ship was reported at 04:15 (local time), 97 miles northwest of Hodeidah.
The UKMTO ( Britain’s Maritime Merchant Shipping Organisation) said a ship was hit by a missile as it was sailing north and suffered “severe damage” from a drone. The vessel in question was the Minoan Courage (76,800-dwt, built in 2004 with a Liberian flag) of Greek interests. The managing company is Modion Maritime, based in Athens.
No injuries have been reported so far.
Shortly afterward, another drone punctured a ballast tank of an unidentified ship sailing northwest of the Hodeidah port of Yemen, which is controlled by the Houthis, the U.K.’s Maritime Trade Operations agency said Tuesday.
According to the UKMTO, the damaged part of the ship is the port ballast tank No. 6.
Some shipping sources identify the ship as the 163,300-dwt Cordelia Moon (built in 2006) – a loaded suezmax en route from Novorossiysk, Russia to Sika, India.
The ship reported no injuries and at 08:37 GMT was said to be proceeding to its next port.
