Tanker Sounion On Fire in the Red Sea | Can the Ship be Salvaged? | 150,000 Tons of Oil Onboard

Ship is On Fire
August 26, 2024

#supplychain #redsea #sounion #houthi

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Original Video

Video Purportedly Shows Massive Explosion on Laden Oil Tanker ‘SOUNION’ in Red Sea

Houthi Attack on Oil Tanker Sparks Fears of Environmental Disaster

Stricken suezmax off Yemen now an ‘imminent’ environmental hazard

Midrats: The Music Stopped at MSC, with Sal Mercogliano

[wgowshipping]

🚨YouTube is once again, limiting the advertising on this video as I show the footage of the Houthi detonating the charges on board Sounion and then explain how that explosion impacted the ship> I could have removed it, but it would diminish the overall intent and information in the video.🚨

[StefanosP]

I'd just like to add, correct pronounciation for SOUNION in Greek is Sue - Knee - On. Sounion, is the tip of the Attica peninsula in Greece, where the temple of Poseidon is located.

[bergspreify]

Crude oil is completely different from Bunker fuel oil! Bunker oil is difficilt to set on fire. Crude oil contain all the different fractions of oil directly as extracted from the ground: nafta, benzene, kerosene, thru to diesel, bunker and asphalt. Crude oil is highly flammable. Crude oil from different oilfields may have different properties.

[PeterFrewer]

Sal, as an ex-VLCC Master I’m particularly interested in this situation. From those pictures of the deck that you showed it is obvious that they have removed many of the manhole covers to allow the cargo to burn. But the hull has not been breached so she is still structurally sound. She could possibly sit there indefinitely just burning quietly. The danger is that the Houthi might decide to send a missile or two into her. Also, as you point out, she is salvageable, but the question then is what country is going to allow it in their waters. We have seen in the past that bad situations turn worse because countries are reluctant to offer a port of refuge. Great videos by the way.

[blaydCA]

Mattel will have a retro board game: Container Ship, where the opponent shouts " you sank my container ship".

[meetmeintheuk]

Sal where would be without your maritime coverage ? You cover major topics that the general public (includes me) should be aware of, that I haven't seen any mainstream media coverage.

[PaulDeCamp]

Losing subscribers means you must be pissing off the wrong people, which happens when you are doing the right kind of journalism.

[mpeqirb]

The actual oil loading on the Sounion may be similar to Bunker Oil, but Crude Oil can be of many types. I have seen drip gasoline come out of the pump jacks effervescing, others are some of the best penetrating oil ever sold i had to make some triangular pipe racks from 6 inch drill stem with a 3 inch bore that was full of pure black paraffin. Just depends on the basin they're pumping out of. Permian Basin is a Unique Field, the junction of 3 continental plates.

[arailway]

Thanks for your work, Sal.
Iraq does have heavy oils,
but in south Texas we had distillets as clear as water.
We had green stuff that you could put in your gas tank.
We had black stuff.
In west Texas we had black stuff that coated the tubing
with white paraffin.
All of that came straight out of the ground, some
with natural gas.
They say that Venuzelan oil is so thick, you have to dilute
it with finer oil to handle it.

[rinrat]

You may have your own opinions, but your posts are balanced and fair. You are the last person who should be limited.

[steveturner]

Made me think immediately of "The Chieftain" and his YouTube channel. When he is touring a military tank he does a segment where he shows how to egress from a burning tank. He says "Oh bugger, the tank's on fire!" where upon he immediately escapes the tank. "Oh bugger, the ship's on fire!"

[Ayelet]

Thank you for this clear update, Sal!

[petersaar]

Thanks for following this. Mainstream media are avoiding this story.

[Jeffrey-edsz]

Great commentary Sal, thanks my former Brother at Sea.😊❤ Keep it up and YouTube will adapt or die. This is the world we are living in, it needs to be seen.😮

[robertlevine]

Sal,

It looks like the Houthis opened the hatches, tank cleaning openings, and vents prior to setting off the explosions. The explosions and fire further opened the tanks so the fire triangle (igniter, fuel and air) was complete. Some crudes are hard to ignite, others are easy to light. It depends on the light ends. Some crudes are intentionally spiked with light ends. These crudes will off gas easily helping the fire burn.

I believe that if the fire continues to burn the upper deck and structure will be weakened by the heat. It is likely that the explosions already weakened the upper deck. If the weather picks up there would be a danger of catastrophic structural failure.

If the Houthis could be kept at bay, the fire under the right circumstances might be extinguishable. It would take a very brave salvor, a lot of foam, and possibly inert gas generators.

I worked with a Smit Salvage Master that worked the Iran-Iraq war, salvaging tankers.

Bob

[redsierra]

a world of cargo ships game idea got me pretty hot

[iraviya]

Firmly agreed, WG missed a golden opportunity here. (Aside: Per game rules, this attack earns Ansar Allah three yellow ribbons, and if the ship sinks they'll also get a red ribbon and an "Arsonist" achievement. So far, their effective use of DOT effects, chokepoints, and ambush, along with their apparent lack of fear of large warships, suggest a skilled destroyer player, though they're still a couple red ribbons short of a Kraken. Finally, if the Sounion is saved, it might earn "Dreadnought" and "Fireproof".)

[lanceferraro]

Well, Mike. Sad that news is sanitized when we can watch violence as entertainment in prime time every night.

[btvndjo]

We need a larger navy, simple. In the 1970s we swapped out ammunition from the returning ship and loaded it on the one deploying. We would take avionics from returning aircraft and use them to repair deploying squadron's aircraft. Additionally deploying units would sercive people from returning units to increase the manning of deployed units. Manning and numbers count.

[katieU]

Thanks for the update Sal. At least the sounion isn't a raging fire.