The Hydrographer of Pakistan issued NAVAREA IX 435/26 at 101500 UTC on 10 November as a Southern Gulf / UAE geotechnical-survey warning. The official text, retrieved from the National Hydrographic Office product file 20261110SEC 435.txt, puts a geotechnical survey in progress at the Port of Fujairah by the self-elevating platform ‘SKATE 3D’ in a five-point harbour area. The charts cited are BA 2837, 3520, 3709 and 3723. Mariners are cautioned. The notice cancels itself at 202359 UTC on 20 November. That is the working primary. It is a numbered port-survey product on Fujairah harbour water. It is not a rewrite of Friday morning’s dedicated 431/26 Fujairah jack-up on SKATE 3D, not a reprint of Monday night’s dedicated 434/26 Kuwait bathymetric survey, and not a conversion of 433/26’s self-cancelling in-force list into a second harbour box.
Pakistan’s NAVAREA IX in-force table, as of Tuesday 10 November, now opens with 435/26 as the first row: DTG 101500 UTC 10 November, region Southern Gulf / UAE, description GEOTECNICAL SURVEY OPERATION. Hold that table spelling. The same Tuesday table still carries dedicated 434/26 as the second row, DTG 091500 UTC 9 November, Northern Gulf / Kuwait, BATHYMETRIC SURVEY. 433/26 remains the unused self-cancelling in-force list. 432/26 remains Friday night’s dedicated Southern Gulf container, already past its 082359 UTC 8 November cancel. 431/26 remains Friday morning’s dedicated Fujairah geotechnical survey on SKATE 3D through 132359 UTC 13 November — still on the Tuesday table as a separate GEOTECNICAL SURVEY OPERATION row. Masters who brief Tuesday afternoon as a Hormuz Attack, as a Fujairah port closure, as SKATE 3D cancelled at 13 November, or as a second 434/26 reprint will have merged a new five-corner harbour box into either a security wreck, a Kuwait survey, or a killed 431/26 watch.
What 435/26 actually printed
The hydrographic text is short and is the working primary. DTG 101500UTC. NAVAREA IX 435/26. SOUTHERN GULF. UAE. CHARTS BA 2837, 3520, 3709 AND 3723. 1. GEOTECHNICAL SURVEY IS IN PROGRESS AT PORT OF FUJAIRAH BY SELF ELEVATING PLATFORM ‘SKATE 3D’ IN FOLLOWING AREA: 25-09.24N 056-22.93E / 25-09.03N 056-22.96E / 25-08.84N 056-22.94E / 25-08.72N 056-22.55E / 25-09.11N 056-22.52E. MARINERS CAUTIONED. 2. CANCEL THIS MSG 202359 UTC NOV 26. Stay with that wording. The coordinator printed an opening quote on SKATE 3D; hold the quotes. The NHO table printed GEOTECNICAL; do not silently tidy that into geotechnical on the table line. The coordinator printed neither an IMO number, an MMSI, a flag, a call sign, a RAM status, a VHF working channel, a numeric berth in cables or metres, a diving window, a dredging plant, a guard-ship name, a port-closure sentence nor a keep-clear radius around the five corners. Stay with the five corners, SKATE 3D, Port of Fujairah, mariners cautioned, the four charts, and the 202359 UTC 20 November cancel.
The geometry is the first briefing fact. The five corners sit between about 25-08.72N and 25-09.24N, 056-22.52E and 056-22.96E — a compact harbour box on the order of half a nautical mile north–south and four-tenths of a nautical mile east–west, on BA 2837 / 3520 / 3709 / 3723 water inside the Port of Fujairah, not in the offshore Fujairah / Khor Fakkan tanker anchorage and not in the Strait of Hormuz. Plot the corners. Friday morning’s dedicated 431/26 remains a four-corner box between about 25-09.18N and 25-10.08N, 056-22.38E and 056-22.63E, charts BA 2858, 3520 and 3526, cancel 132359 UTC 13 November. Tuesday’s five corners sit slightly south and slightly east of that Friday box. They are not the same polygon. A passage plan that deletes 431/26 because 435/26 is now the top NHO row has dropped a still-in-force jack-up through 13 November. A passage plan that files 435/26 as “431 extended” without plotting the new five points has put a 20 November cancel on the wrong harbour corners. Do not treat the offshore anchorage as this box. Do not treat Khor Fakkan as closed. Do not run 10–20 November as if the Port of Fujairah fairway were empty of survey plant.
The clock is the second briefing fact. 435/26 carries a 101500 UTC 10 November issue time and a printed cancel at 202359 UTC 20 November. That is ten days on the port plot, not a two-hour window and not an until-further-notice jack-up. Dedicated 431/26 still kills itself at 132359 UTC 13 November. From 101500 UTC 10 November through 132359 UTC 13 November both numbered boxes are live on the same harbour. From 13 November 23:59 UTC through 20 November 23:59 UTC only 435/26 remains, unless a later NAVAREA moves it. A passage plan that treats 25-09.24N 056-22.93E as live after 202359 UTC 20 November without a replacement NAVAREA has over-read a self-cancelling survey. A passage plan that drops the box at dusk on 10 November, or that only budgets Friday morning’s 13 November kill, has under-read a cancel that now sits on 20 November. The coordinator did not print daily hours inside those ten days. Do not invent a 0800–1600 UTC working window. Do not invent a night suspension. Hold the survey as in progress from the 101500 UTC stamp through the printed 20 November cancel.
The chart list is the third briefing fact. 435/26 cites BA 2837, 3520, 3709 and 3723. Dedicated 431/26 cited BA 2858, 3520 and 3526. BA 3520 is the only shared sheet. Do not copy Friday’s 2858 / 3526 pair onto Tuesday’s notice. Do not drop 3709 and 3723 because a master already had 3520 open for 431/26. The coordinator issued a new chart set against a new five-point area. Plot both sets until 431/26 dies.
The missing IMO, MMSI, flag, RAM and numeric-berth lines are omissions, not a completed jack-up order. Open-register colour, held separately and not as a 435/26 fact, has previously attached MMSI 620671000 and a Comoros flag to a hull broadcasting as SKATE 3D, with no IMO number in that register. Do not promote that MMSI, that flag, or “IMO 0” onto Tuesday’s NAVAREA. Do not invent Channel 16 as a survey working channel. Do not borrow 434/26’s six Kuwait hulls, 411/26’s Qatar pipelay berth, or 290/26’s buoy list onto a polygon that already says mariners cautioned. Give the five corners and the named platform. Do not invent a one-nautical-mile halo around them.
Same-board wrap, not this berth: 433/26, 070300 UTC 7 November, INFORCE LIST, unused as dedicated. 432/26 remains Friday night’s dedicated Southern Gulf floating and partially submerged container at 25-09.71N 054-54.06E, cancel 082359 UTC 8 November — now past; the Tuesday NHO row is a stale listing, not a live 10 November caution. 431/26 remains Friday morning’s dedicated SKATE 3D geotechnical survey at Port of Fujairah through 132359 UTC 13 November — still in force, not cancelled by 435/26. 434/26 remains Monday night’s dedicated six-hull Kuwait bathymetric survey. 428/26 remains unused Amaala Triple Bay seaplane wrap. 427/26 remains dedicated Shura Island seaplane zone. 425/26 remains the dedicated Selat Storm wreck. 414/26 remains the dedicated November Pakistan firing series through 302000 UTC 30 November. 290/26 remains the in-force Fujairah reclamation-buoy line. Those clocks are separate.
What this is not
This is not a rewrite of 431/26, and it is not SKATE 3D cancelled at 13 November. Friday morning’s dedicated 431/26 remains a Port of Fujairah geotechnical survey by self-elevating platform SKATE 3D, four corners around 25-09.6N 056-22.5E, mariners cautioned, charts BA 2858, 3520 and 3526, cancel 132359 UTC 13 November. 435/26 names the same platform and the same port. It does not name 431/26. It does not cancel 431/26. It prints five new corners, a new chart set, and a 20 November kill. A passage plan that drops the Friday box at 101500 UTC 10 November has deleted a still-in-force harbour product. A passage plan that keeps only Friday’s four corners through 20 November has ignored Tuesday’s five-point relocation. Hold both numbers until each printed cancel. Do not collapse 435/26 onto 431/26 as “the same jack-up, later date.”
This is not a rewrite of 434/26, and it is not the Kuwait survey moved south. Monday night’s dedicated 434/26 remains a Northern Gulf / Kuwait bathymetric survey by vessels ‘VISION 2, MOSAAID 01001, NAIA, KNOZE 7, SEP 2 AND AL-NOWKHADA ABOODAH’ in an eight-point box around 29-01N 048-11E, mariners cautioned, 378/26 cancelled, no printed kill against 434/26. 435/26 names neither Kuwait nor those six hulls. 434/26 names neither Fujairah nor SKATE 3D. A passage plan that files Tuesday afternoon under “the Gulf survey” has put a Fujairah jack-up on the Kuwait approaches. Keep 434/26 on its own Northern Gulf sheet.
This is not a rewrite of 432/26, and it is not a second Southern Gulf container. Friday night’s dedicated 432/26 remains an adrift floating and partially submerged shipping container in the vicinity of 25-09.71N 054-54.06E, mariners requested to navigate with extreme caution, cancel 082359 UTC 8 November. That cancel is now past. 435/26 prints neither a container nor 25-09.71N. Do not brief Tuesday afternoon as “the Dubai approaches container moved into Fujairah harbour.” Do not restore 432/26 because the Tuesday table still lists it. Do not convert a geotechnical survey into a floating-object casualty.
This is not a rewrite of 433/26, and it is not a new in-force catalogue. 433/26 remains the 070300 UTC 7 November self-cancelling list of navigational warnings in force, unused as dedicated. 435/26 is a new numbered survey issued after that list. Do not treat 433/26 as having already included 435. Do not treat 435/26 as a reprint of the catalogue. A later in-force list that adds 435 will be a later product.
This is not a rewrite of 290/26, and it is not a second Fujairah reclamation product. 290/26 remains the August buoy field for an ongoing reclamation operation at Fujairah Port. 435/26 names a self-elevating platform, names a geotechnical survey, names five corners around 25-09N 056-22.7E, and kills itself on 20 November. 290/26 does not name SKATE 3D. 435/26 does not reprint 290/26’s buoy list. A passage plan that drops the reclamation buoys because a second jack-up number is now the top NHO row has deleted an August product the coordinator has not cancelled. Hulls working the Port of Fujairah this week need the buoy field, Friday’s 431/26 box through 13 November, and Tuesday’s 435/26 box through 20 November.
This is not a security-incident NAVAREA and not a wreck product. 425/26 remains the dedicated Selat Storm wreck. 420/26 remains the dedicated RITI fire-and-anchor. 417/26 remains the dedicated Quba wreck. 389/26 remains the Gulf of Oman oil-tanker security-incident caution. Tuesday morning’s dedicated IMO 131-count remains Huda on the highlighted-incidents board as at 9 November, 131 confirmed, 25 seafarer fatalities. Dedicated Update 112 remains the 8 November JMIC note. Dedicated 197-26, 198-26, 199-26 and 200-26 remain unnamed UKMTO tanker files. 435/26 names none of those hulls, prints no projectile, and does not sit east of Khasab. Do not brief Tuesday afternoon as a Hormuz Attack because a Fujairah jack-up is the new top NHO row. UKMTO still ends at dedicated 200-26. No 201-26, no Update 113 and no IMO 132 board row this run.
This is not 411/26, and it is not a Qatar pipelay rewrite. 411/26 remains the dedicated McDermott DB30 subsea-pipeline berth in the central Gulf / Qatar. 435/26 is a Fujairah harbour jack-up, not a Qatar trench. This is also not NAVAREA III 0170/26 on Abdulhamid Han, not Irakleio 1370/2026 on AEGAEO, not Irakleio 1411/26 on Abeille Marengo, and not HNHS 1366/26 on the Elefsina parachute disc. Those are survey, drilling and research products on other coordinators. They do not belong on a Fujairah 25-09N watch.
This is not a Fujairah, Khor Fakkan or Hormuz port closure, not a Gulf of Oman TSS change, and not a rewrite of 219/26’s Dubai no-anchoring zone. 435/26 prints mariners cautioned inside five harbour corners. It does not close the Port of Fujairah. It does not close the offshore tanker anchorage. It does not reopen Hormuz. It does not cancel 431/26, 434/26, 414/26, 425/26 or 290/26. It is not a Houthi merchant-attack product. 435/26 prints a geotechnical survey in progress — not a strike, not a projectile, and not a keep-clear in nautical miles.
Operational implications
For a master inbound to the Port of Fujairah, shifting between the inner harbour and the offshore anchorage, or bunkering and waiting on BA 2837 / 3520 / 3709 / 3723 water this week, 435/26 is a harbour-plot amendment before it is a construction story. The five corners sit in a compact box on the order of half by four-tenths of a nautical mile, slightly south and east of Friday’s still-live 431/26 box. The notice names the platform. It does not print a vertical limit, a lighting scheme, a VHF working channel, a named guard ship, or a numeric berth. Mariners cautioned is the whole instruction, with a hard cancel at 202359 UTC on 20 November. A passage plan that treats 25-09.24N 056-22.93E as a charted obstruction after that cancel without a replacement NAVAREA has over-read a self-cancelling survey. A passage plan that only annotates “jack-up, Fujairah” without the five corners, or that keeps only Friday’s four corners, has under-read a numbered NAVAREA that exists to be plotted.
The overlap with 431/26 is the first operational trap. From this afternoon through 132359 UTC 13 November the Port of Fujairah carries two numbered SKATE 3D boxes: Friday’s four corners on BA 2858 / 3520 / 3526, and Tuesday’s five corners on BA 2837 / 3520 / 3709 / 3723. They overlap in intent — same platform, same port, same “mariners cautioned” — and they do not overlap as identical polygons. A pilot briefing that says “the jack-up is still in the 431 box” after 101500 UTC 10 November has not plotted Tuesday’s south-east shift. A DPA who kills the entire SKATE 3D watch at 13 November has dropped seven extra days of 435/26. Hold 431/26 through its own 13 November cancel. Hold 435/26 through 20 November. Do not invent a single merged harbour exclusion from 25-08.72N to 25-10.08N. Plot the printed corners.
290/26 is the third Fujairah problem on the same port. The August reclamation-buoy field remains in force. Hulls working the Port of Fujairah this week need the buoy field, Friday’s 431/26 box through 13 November, and Tuesday’s 435/26 box through 20 November. Do not assume the reclamation buoys are idle because a second jack-up number is now the top NHO row. Do not assume either jack-up is idle because the fixture is “only an anchorage wait.” The coordinator issued a new number against the harbour, not a cancellation of the August field and not a cancellation of 431/26.
For DPAs with Fujairah, Khor Fakkan, Hormuz, Sohar or Gulf of Oman stems this week, the operational question is whether the planned harbour track clips the five-corner list, not whether the United Arab Emirates “closed Fujairah.” 435/26 does not close the port. It does not close the offshore anchorage. It does not reopen Hormuz. It does not cancel 431/26, 434/26, 414/26, 425/26 or 290/26. A fixture that only budgeted Monday night’s Kuwait survey, Tuesday morning’s IMO 131-count on Huda, or Friday morning’s first SKATE 3D box has not budgeted a second named jack-up on the Fujairah harbour plot through 20 November. 414/26 remains the November four-box Pakistan firing product through 30 November. 434/26 remains the Kuwait named-hull survey. Those clocks are separate.
The stale rows on this Tuesday’s NHO table are a second briefing trap. 432/26 is still printed as a floating or partially submerged container. That notice cancelled at 082359 UTC 8 November. Do not restore it because the Tuesday table still lists it. Do not treat 435/26 as the replacement for 432/26; a Fujairah jack-up does not cancel a Southern Gulf container. 433/26 is the 7 November in-force catalogue, unused as dedicated. Everything else on the Tuesday table is either a dedicated earlier file or a stale listing. 431/26 is not stale. It is still live through 13 November.
Congestion colour around Fujairah / Khor Fakkan remains colour on earlier JMIC files, not a 435/26 count and not a reason to treat the harbour survey as an anchorage closure. Tuesday morning’s dedicated IMO 131-count and Sunday night’s Update 112 remain Hormuz / Gulf of Oman security products. They do not plot 25-08.72N 056-22.55E. Do not recast 10 November afternoon as a Fujairah exclusion zone inside the five corners, a named-platform casualty, a rewrite of 431/26, a rewrite of 434/26, or a Hormuz product. The confirmed facts are NAVAREA IX 435/26, 101500 UTC 10 November, Port of Fujairah, SKATE 3D, BA 2837 / 3520 / 3709 / 3723, five corners, mariners cautioned, cancel 202359 UTC 20 November, with dedicated 431/26 still in force on the same Tuesday table through 13 November.
What Operators Should Note
- Log 435/26 as a second Fujairah harbour jack-up survey, not as a port closure and not as a Hormuz file. NAVAREA IX 435/26, 101500 UTC 10 November. Southern Gulf / UAE. Charts BA 2837, 3520, 3709 and 3723. Geotechnical survey in progress at Port of Fujairah by self-elevating platform ‘SKATE 3D’ in following area: 25-09.24N 056-22.93E / 25-09.03N 056-22.96E / 25-08.84N 056-22.94E / 25-08.72N 056-22.55E / 25-09.11N 056-22.52E. Mariners cautioned. Cancel 202359 UTC 20 November. Official file
20261110SEC 435.txt. NHO Tuesday table: first row, GEOTECNICAL SURVEY OPERATION. The notice names neither IMO, MMSI, flag, RAM, VHF, numeric berth nor a harbour-master closure. Hold the printed quotes on SKATE 3D. This is not 431/26 cancelled, not 434/26, not 432/26, not 433/26, and not a Fujairah shutdown. - Plot the new five-corner 25-09N harbour polygon beside Friday’s four-corner box, not instead of it. Tuesday’s corners sit about 0.5 by 0.4 nautical miles inside the Port of Fujairah, slightly south and east of dedicated 431/26. Do not slide the box out to the Fujairah / Khor Fakkan tanker anchorage. Do not invent a VHF working channel, a numeric berth, a diving window or a night suspension. Open-register MMSI 620671000 / Comoros colour stays off the NAVAREA. 431/26 remains the dedicated Friday SKATE 3D survey through 132359 UTC 13 November — unused as a rewrite, still in force, not cancelled by 435/26. 290/26 remains the dedicated August reclamation-buoy field at the same port.
- Give the printed 20 November cancel, then kill the 435/26 watch. In progress from 101500 UTC 10 November. Cancel 202359 UTC 20 November. Do not treat the box as until further notice. Do not drop it at dusk on 10 November. Do not kill it at 132359 UTC 13 November because that is 431/26’s cancel. Do not keep avoiding 25-09.24N 056-22.93E after 202359 UTC 20 November without a replacement NAVAREA. Do not invent daily working hours inside those ten days.
- Keep the stale NHO rows and the in-force catalogue off the live folder. 433/26 remains the 070300 UTC 7 November self-cancelling in-force list, unused as dedicated. 432/26 cancelled at 082359 UTC 8 November; the Tuesday listing is stale. Do not restore those numbers because they still appear on the 10 November table. Do not treat 435/26 as having already been inside 433/26.
- Keep the Kuwait survey, the Hormuz wrecks and the Pakistan firing series on their own files. 434/26 remains dedicated Northern Gulf / Kuwait, six named hulls, eight corners, 378/26 cancelled. 425/26 remains dedicated Selat Storm. 420/26 remains dedicated RITI. 417/26 remains dedicated Quba. 427/26 remains dedicated Shura Island. 428/26 remains unused Amaala wrap. 414/26 remains the November four-box product through 302000 UTC 30 November. 411/26 remains the Qatar pipelay berth. 389/26 Petro Dolphin remains an in-force security-incident caution. Dedicated 197-26, 198-26, 199-26, 200-26, Update 112 and Tuesday morning’s IMO 131-count on Huda remain their own dedicated files. UKMTO still ends at dedicated 200-26. No 201-26, no Update 113 and no IMO 132 board row this run.
- Fujairah, Khor Fakkan and Hormuz are not closed by this notice. Port of Fujairah traffic now carries two numbered jack-up boxes — 431/26 through 13 November and 435/26 through 20 November — with the August reclamation-buoy field still in force beside them. Watch a later NAVAREA that moves 25-09.24N 056-22.93E, adds a radius / RAM / VHF / IMO, cancels 431/26 early, or extends past 202359 UTC 20 November — not a completed soil campaign, not a Comoros naming, and not a Hormuz rewrite.
Regulas Shipping will keep lining NAVAREA IX 435/26 against Friday morning’s still-in-force 431/26 Fujairah jack-up and against Monday night’s dedicated 434/26 Kuwait survey so operators can treat Tuesday afternoon’s five-corner SKATE 3D box as a numbered 10–20 November harbour caution, not as a 13 November cancel, a Kuwait reprint, or a Fujairah shutdown.
