The oil tanker MV Skylight was struck off the coast of Oman in waters near the strait of Hormuz, injuring four crew members. The attack is the first confirmed hit on a commercial vessel since the IRGC broadcast its "no ships may pass" closure on VHF Channel 16 at the conflict's outset. Two other vessels — MKD Vyom, which suffered an engine room fire from a projectile strike, and Sea La Donna, details still pending — were also attacked in the same period. In hours, the strait moved from a zone shipping companies were avoiding voluntarily to one where vessels were under direct fire.
The economic consequences arrived immediately. Vessel traffic through the strait fell 70%. More than 150 tankers sat at anchor in open Gulf waters. CMA CGM, Maersk, Hapag-Lloyd, Nippon Yusen, Mitsui, and Kawasaki Kisen all halted transits. CMA CGM imposed an emergency surcharge of $2,000–$4,000 per container, effective immediately. Brent Crude stood at roughly $73 before the first strikes and opened Saturday at $82.37 — a price set before the tanker attacks. Goldman Sachs had forecast a peak of $110; JP Morgan projected $120–$130 for a prolonged conflict and raised its US recession probability to 35% . With merchant vessels now absorbing hits, those figures look like floor estimates rather than worst-case scenarios.
The last sustained military campaign against commercial shipping in these waters was the 1984–88 Tanker War during the Iran-Iraq conflict. Over four years, 546 vessels were struck; insurance premiums tripled; Kuwait reflagged its tankers under the US flag to secure naval escorts. Three vessels have been hit here in 72 hours. The modern global economy is more exposed than it was in the 1980s — roughly 20% of the world's traded oil and a quarter of global LNG transits the strait daily. Alternative routes exist: the Saudi east-west pipeline, the UAE's Habshan-Fujairah bypass. Neither can handle more than a fraction of normal throughput. Mohsen Rezai, secretary of Iran's Expediency Council, had declared the strait "officially open" while simultaneously calling US warships "legitimate targets". The four injured crew of the MV Skylight are the first evidence of what that contradiction looks like in practice.
