Greece’s Ministry of Shipping said the Greek-flag LNG carrier Maran Gas Mystras was struck by an unidentified projectile while leaving the Strait of Hormuz. The 30-person crew, including 11 Greek nationals, was safe. No injuries were reported. Kathimerini, Greek City Times and Cyprus Mail, via Hellenic Shipping News on Wednesday, 7 October, carried the same ministry line. Maran Gas later said the ship and crew were safe, the hull remained fully operational, and there was no report of pollution or of damage affecting the voyage. Initial reports put the strike near the waterline on Sunday, 4 October. Smoke was seen. The ship kept propulsion and continued under her own power toward the Fujairah anchorage in the United Arab Emirates. The origin and type of the object have not been established. That is the working primary. It is a named LNG hull, a named flag, a named crew split, and a company statement that the ship is still a going concern. It is not a rewrite of Tuesday’s dedicated On Peace medevac off Musandam, not a rewrite of Monday’s dedicated unnamed engine-room fire in Warning 156-26, and not a rewrite of Sunday’s dedicated Lipsi / Warning 150-26 engine-room file.
Do not treat Seatrade’s Tuesday industry matching of Monday’s unnamed master report in Warning 156-26 to this hull as a UKMTO naming. 156-26 remains an unnamed Monday product: a tanker in the Strait of Hormuz struck by an unknown projectile, an engine-room fire the crew were fighting, no casualties and no environmental impact at warning time. Greece timed Maran Gas Mystras to a Sunday waterline hit, retained propulsion and a Fujairah run under her own power. Those facts do not complete 156-26. Keep the files on separate lines until UKMTO or JMIC prints the name.
What Athens and the manager published, and what they did not
The ministry named the ship, the flag, the crew count, the Greek national count, and the human result. Maran Gas added a fully-operational line, a no-pollution line and a continuing-voyage line. Neither published a latitude and longitude, a cargo quantity, a load port, a discharge port, a tank sounding, a classification-society damage note, or a responsible party. “Unidentified projectile” and “unknown object” are the working phrases. Stay with them. Bankingnews and other Greek recaps that call the week’s tape “Iranian attacks” are secondary attribution. They do not convert a ministry unidentified-object line into an IRGC naming.
Sunday, 4 October, is the strike day in the Kathimerini / Greek City Times / Cyprus Mail recap. Tuesday, 6 October, is when Athens put the name on the record. Hellenic Shipping News dated its Cyprus Mail pickup Wednesday, 7 October. Do not collapse those clocks. Do not brief a Tuesday Hormuz hit on this hull because India and Oman timed On Peace to Tuesday. On Peace is Panama-flag MT On Peace, IMO 9893204, 12 injured, Omani air-force medevac to Khasab. That file is already on this desk. Maran Gas Mystras is a different ship, a different flag, a different people picture and a different day.
The International Maritime Organization’s highlighted-incidents board, as at 6 October, still listed 93 confirmed incidents and 24 seafarer fatalities. It named Cameroon Prosperity, Lipsi, Ghana Prosperity, Promise and Kazimah III among the early-October hulls. It did not, in the copy used here, name Maran Gas Mystras. Greek City Times noted the same gap against the 5 October board, which already had Lipsi. An IMO naming, if it comes, will be a new primary. Until then, do not back-fit this casualty onto the board, and do not treat the board’s silence as a finding that the ship was not hit.
Open particulars, kept separate from the strike
Open registers matching IMO 9658238 describe Maran Gas Mystras as a Greece-flag LNG tanker, MMSI 241350000, call sign SVCB6, about 294 by 44 metres, about 103,893 gross tons and 89,269 deadweight, built in 2015, port of registry Piraeus. Cargo capacity is given as about 159,800 cubic metres. That is a tank volume, not a sounding on Sunday. Registered owner is Blueskies Shipping Company Ltd. Maran Gas Maritime is commercial and ISM manager. The ship is controlled by the Angelicoussis Shipping Group and classed by Lloyd’s Register in the Cyprus Mail recap. MagicPort’s 7 October screening colour, not a sanctions finding by Athens, listed the hull as not appearing on the major government watchlists it checks. Do not convert a screening page into a P&I card, and do not brief a cargo figure from cubic-metre capacity.
Lipsi, IMO 1025033, Liberia-flag LR2, Dynacom, is the dedicated 5 October 03:30 file matching Warning 150-26 and NAVAREA IX 352/26. Cyprus Mail is right that two Greek-linked groups were named inside a few days. That is group colour. It does not merge the casualties. Lipsi was an engine-room hit, later drifting on the NAVAREA. Maran Gas Mystras, on the manager’s account, kept propulsion and did not need a tug. Do not write a second Lipsi.
What this does, and does not, do to the unnamed tape
UKMTO’s last public numbered products on this desk remain Warning 156-26 (Monday, 5 October, 1637 UTC, master, unnamed tanker, engine-room fire being fought) and Warning 157-26 (Tuesday, 6 October, time-late verified source, unnamed outbound oil tanker, unknown projectile on 5 October, time to be confirmed, no casualty line). Advisory 152-26 remains the dedicated inbound IRGC turn-back 11 nautical miles north of Khasab. JMIC Update 102, ICOD 041500 UTC 4 October, is still the last public numbered regional note, threat level SEVERE, names withheld until further notice, covering 147-26 through 150-26. Sunday’s Maran Gas Mystras strike sits after that cut-off. Do not assign 148-26, 149-26, 150-26, 153-26, 154-26, 155-26, 156-26 or 157-26 to this hull.
Seatrade on Tuesday also matched a late-reported 4 October LPG hit to Singapore-flag Gas Vela (Sinogas) and matched Vanguard colour on Cameroon Prosperity and Ghana Prosperity to Sinokor VLCCs. The IMO board as at 6 October now prints Cameroon Prosperity, IMO 9315159 in open registers — the board’s own 93151598 string is an eight-digit typo — damaged, no pollution, 4 October, Strait of Hormuz; and Ghana Prosperity, IMO 9732541, damaged, no pollution, 3 October, Strait of Hormuz. Those are IMO names on already-unused industry matches. They are not this article. Do not fold Sinokor, Gas Vela or the Prosperity pair into Maran Gas Mystras. Do not treat Seatrade’s “none of the four are on Iran’s PGSA blacklist” sentence as a transit permit.
Operational implications
An LNG carrier that takes a waterline hit, makes smoke, keeps propulsion and runs for Fujairah is a different problem set from a crude tanker with an engine-room fire the crew are still fighting, and a different problem set from a 12-person medevac off Musandam. The cargo is refrigerated methane, not persistent oil. The people picture on the ministry’s account is 30 safe, including 11 Greeks, no injuries. The salvage picture on the manager’s account is no tug, no pollution, no operation-affecting damage. Operators should still treat a waterline strike on an LNG hull as a containment, gas-detection and secondary-barrier watch until class has walked the tanks, even when the commercial line is “fully operational.”
Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and other Gulf loaders have no alternative maritime export door for LNG equivalent to the crude shuttle now running into the Gulf of Oman. International Energy Agency figures cited in the Cyprus Mail recap put just over 112 billion cubic metres of LNG through Hormuz in 2025, about 20 per cent of global LNG trade, around 90 per cent of it bound for Asia. US Energy Information Administration figures in the same recap put LNG flows through the strait at 10.5 billion cubic feet per day in the fourth quarter of 2025 and 0.8 billion cubic feet per day in the second quarter of 2026. September’s recovery — S&P Global Energy 19 shipments, Kpler 21, against 15 in June, still about 75 per cent below February in the Bloomberg colour used in the companion piece — is a traffic recovery, not a safety recovery. A named LNG casualty on a Greek-flag Angelicoussis hull, with the crew unhurt and the ship still steaming, is exactly the kind of near-miss that will be read in Ras Laffan, Fujairah and Piraeus as proof that ballast and laden gas carriers are inside the same projectile picture as the crude tape, not outside it.
CSO desks on Greek-flag and Angelicoussis-managed gas ships should assume flag, class, P&I and the Greek ministry will want the master’s report, the VDR, the last position before the object, tank and cofferdam atmosphere readings, and whether the ship was laden, heel, or ballast. Charterers who have used this hull, or sisters under Maran Gas Maritime, should treat Sunday as a named casualty on the southern Omani side of the strait, not as proof that only PGSA-listed or “shadow” ships are exposed. Fujairah remains the working repair and survey anchorage on this account. It is not a completed class recommendation.
What Operators Should Note
- Log a named Greek-flag LNG hit, not a rewrite of On Peace, Lipsi or 156-26. Ministry of Shipping, Tuesday 6 October, covering a Sunday 4 October exit from Hormuz: Maran Gas Mystras, unidentified projectile near the waterline, smoke, propulsion retained, 30 crew safe including 11 Greeks, no injuries. Maran Gas: fully operational, no pollution, continuing to Fujairah under her own power. Do not invent a cargo cubic-metre figure, a position, or a confirmed attacker.
- Use IMO 9658238 as matching, not as a ministry line. Open particulars: 2015 LNG tanker, about 294 × 44 m, about 103,893 gt / 89,269 dwt, about 159,800 cbm, MMSI 241350000, call sign SVCB6, Greece / Piraeus, owner Blueskies Shipping Company Ltd, manager Maran Gas Maritime, Angelicoussis group, Lloyd’s Register in the Cyprus Mail recap. Capacity is not a sounding.
- Do not assign a UKMTO warning number to this hull. 156-26 remains an unnamed Monday master report of an engine-room fire with no casualties at warning time. 157-26 remains a Tuesday time-late Attack warning of an unnamed outbound oil tanker on 5 October. Seatrade’s possible 156-26 match is industry colour. JMIC Update 102 still withholds names through 150-26. IMO’s 6 October board still does not print Maran Gas Mystras.
- Keep Lipsi, On Peace and the Sinokor / Sinogas matches on their own lines. Lipsi is the dedicated 5 October engine-room / NAVAREA file. On Peace is the dedicated 7 October 12-injured Musandam file. Cameroon Prosperity and Ghana Prosperity are now on the IMO board as damaged, no pollution; Gas Vela remains an unused Vanguard / Pole Star LPG match. None of those complete Sunday’s LNG waterline hit.
- Brief an LNG-specific waterline watch on Hormuz exits. Gas detection, secondary barrier, cofferdams and a Fujairah survey plan even when the commercial line is “fully operational.” JMIC threat level for the Strait remains SEVERE. AIS-on still carries hail and targeting colour on Update 102. The companion Qatar ballast-fleet file is commercial positioning, not a finding that this ship was Qatari cargo.
- Do not recast Sunday as a Hormuz reopen, a PGSA exemption, a confirmed IRGC naming, or a completed MARPOL finding. Stay with unidentified projectile. Flag, class, P&I and the ministry own the damage until a class note, a pollution volume, or a UKMTO/JMIC name appears.
Regulas Shipping will keep lining the Greek ministry’s Maran Gas Mystras account against Maran Gas’s fully-operational statement, the unnamed UKMTO tape and the IMO board so operators can treat the Sunday waterline hit as a separate LNG casualty, not as a completed 156-26 naming or a reason to fold gas carriers out of the Hormuz projectile watch.
