CAIRO (Reuters) – The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) organization and British maritime security firm Ambrey said on Wednesday they had received reports of incidents near Yemen’s Aden.
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) organization said in an advisory note that a ship had been attacked 60 nautical miles southeast of Aden.
The “vessel has been hit on port side by an uncrewed aerial system,” UKMTO said, adding that there was a fire onboard, which had since been extinguished.
“Vessel and crew are safe and proceeding to next port of call”, UKMTO later added in an updated advisory.
Ambrey said that a Marshall Islands-flagged bulk carrier was hit by an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) 66 miles southeast of Aden as it was heading east along the Gulf of Aden.
“The vessel’s gangway incurred damage, and at the time of writing it was deemed not usable”, Ambrey added in its advisory note.
Yemen’s Iranian-aligned Houthi militants, who control the most populous parts of Yemen, have launched wave after wave of exploding drones and missiles at commercial vessels since Nov. 19, in what they say is a protest against Israel’s military operations in Gaza.
The Houthi campaign has been very disruptive to international shipping, causing some companies to suspend transits through the Red Sea and instead take the much longer, costlier journey around Africa.
(This story has been refiled to fix a typo in paragraph 1)
(Reporting by Yomna Ehab and Muhammad Al Gebaly, Editing by Chris Reese and Sandra Maler)
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