Madar (International) - Oman has rescued 25 crew members from a burning crude oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz, the Omani Maritime Security Centre said in a statement on Friday, October 30, 2026, Al Jazeera English reported, citing AFP and AP.
The centre said it had evacuated the people aboard the merchant ship RITI, which it said was flying the Panamanian flag, while the tracking website MarineTraffic identified it as a crude oil tanker. The crew's nationalities and any injuries were not disclosed.
The incident came as Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said three oil tankers had been halted while attempting to use "unauthorised routes" to cross the strait. It is unclear whether one of them was the tanker whose crew Oman evacuated.
The IRGC said all three vessels were carrying oil, one of them a supertanker, and had been halted following "incidents" or after hitting mines. In a separate statement, it said a supertanker carrying more than two million barrels of oil had "exploded and caught fire". Iran's navy also said it destroyed an unmanned enemy craft east of the strait.
Tehran has asserted control over much of the waterway since the US and Israel launched the war on February 28, and has repeatedly warned vessels against passing without its permission. The US military denies the mine claims: Central Command chief Brad Cooper said on Friday that the strait's internationally recognised primary transit routes had been cleared of Iranian sea mines.
