The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations published Warning 175-26 on Saturday as a second ATTACK product off Al Jubayl. The working primary is the PDF. The incident date is 16 October 2026. The incident time is 1922 UTC. The source line is Master. UKMTO says it received a report of an incident 78 nautical miles northeast of Al Jubayl, Saudi Arabia. The master of a tanker reported being attacked by a rocket-propelled grenade from a small boat, resulting in damage to the aft port quarter. Crew are accounted for and reported safe. A complete damage assessment and environmental impact are unknown at the time of report. Vessels are advised to transit with caution and report any suspicious activity to UKMTO while authorities investigate. UKMTO printed neither a ship name, an IMO number, a flag, a cargo, a heading, a casualty count beyond “safe,” nor a coordinate pair beyond the Al Jubayl offset.
This is a separate numbered file from Warning 174-26. 174-26 is the 0900 UTC time-late Company Security Officer product: unknown projectile, 68 nautical miles northeast of Al Jubayl, crew evacuated, no reported environmental impact at time of report. 175-26 is ten hours later, about ten nautical miles further northeast, a master report, a small-boat RPG, aft-port-quarter damage, crew still accounted for on the working read, and no completed damage or pollution line. Reuters, in an Arab News write-through updated at 11:20 on 17 October, reported both Saturday products and said it could not immediately establish whether the two reports referred to the same incident. Keep the two PDFs apart until UKMTO collapses them. Do not brief 175-26 as an increment on 174-26, and do not brief it as Friday night’s dedicated MT ST 3 Hormuz naming.
As of this writing JMIC’s last numbered public note remains Update 105, JMIC# 001 26, information cut-off 151300 UTC 15 October. That note printed the Arabian Gulf at MODERATE and said no confirmed attacks or disruptions had been reported in the Arabian Gulf in that period. Both Saturday warnings sit after that cut-off. The IMO highlighted-incidents board is still printed as 113 confirmed incidents as at 14 October. UKMTO’s public recent-incidents board now shows 175-26 after 174-26 after 173-26. Do not brief Saturday as Update 106 or as an IMO-board move past 113.
What UKMTO actually printed
The confirmed tape is the weapon and the geometry. ATTACK. 175-26. 16 October 2026. 1922 UTC. Master. 78 nautical miles northeast of Al Jubayl, Saudi Arabia. Tanker. Attacked by an RPG from a small boat. Damage to the aft port quarter. Crew accounted for and reported safe. Complete damage assessment unknown. Environmental impact unknown. Transit with caution. Report suspicious activity to UKMTO. Authorities investigating. Rudaw and Iran International carried the same Saturday English read. None of those outlets added a hull name, a JMIC listing, or a flag-state damage survey.
1922 UTC is 2222 Arabia Standard Time. The product is a night small-boat attack, not a daytime unknown-projectile line of the kind that filled 166-26 through 173-26 inside the Strait. UKMTO did not print a skiff count, a boarding, a citadel, a warning shot, or whether the tanker altered course. It printed one grenade, one boat, and an aft port quarter. That is the limit of the primary.
Industry colour and Iranian-facing aggregators moved faster than the PDF. Some headlines put IRGC on the RPG. UKMTO did not. Update 105 already told masters that IRGC activity, UAV overflight and hail pressure persist in the wider theatre; that is the last numbered JMIC assessment, not a Saturday finding that 175-26 was an IRGC boarding team. No open-register hull has been matched to this number on a flag or class primary. Do not import Vanguard’s 174-26 Safeen Principal colour onto 175-26. That naming was already unresolved industry colour on the other PDF, and it conflicts with the open-register UAE containership of the same name.
Operational implications
For a CSO with tankers still working Jubail, Ras Tanura, King Fahd Industrial Port and the Dammam approaches, Saturday night is a close-range small-boat problem in the western Arabian Gulf, not another Hormuz TSS projectile. Update 105’s Arabian Gulf outlook was MODERATE: residual kinetic risk, GNSS interference, and elevated targeting risk for AIS-on ships sitting still. 175-26 does not automatically rewrite that assessment into SEVERE. It does tell a master that the 16 October tape now includes a rocket-propelled grenade fired from a small boat about 78 nautical miles off the Saudi Gulf coast, with confirmed aft-port-quarter damage and no completed survey. BMP watchkeeping, citadel readiness, small-boat reporting and a darkened or unpredictable night posture belong on the passage plan for that stretch. They were already implied by Update 105’s residual kinetic line. They are no longer theoretical on this number.
Aft port quarter is the other operational fact. That is steering gear, port-side bunkers, the after mooring deck and, on many tankers, the approach to the engine-room casing. UKMTO says the crew are safe and does not say the ship is not under command. It also does not say the ship continued passage. A DPA should log hull damage aft, an unknown watertight and fire state, and an unknown pollution state until the flag, class, or a later UKMTO revision prints a continue-passage, a NUC, a tow or a refuge call. Do not treat “crew safe” as “no damage that matters to the next port state.” Do not treat “environmental impact unknown” as a clean bill.
The two Saturday products change the geography of the week’s numbered tape. 165-26 through 173-26, on the dedicated Update 105 list, sat at Sohar and in the Strait. 160-26 / GEM NO.2 was the earlier UAE-anchorage Arabian Gulf extension. 174-26 and 175-26 sit off Al Jubayl, on the Saudi side of the western Gulf, on the same calendar day. That is a westward shift of the public UKMTO attack list, not a legal finding that Iran, or anyone else, has opened a new campaign against Saudi terminals. UKMTO printed Al Jubayl as a position of convenience. It did not print a terminal, a berth, or a Saudi Ports Authority closure.
Charterers will ask whether a night RPG off Jubail changes additional war-risk, embarkation of security teams, or the decision to wait at anchor with AIS on. Saturday’s 175-26 primary does not reprint a Joint War Committee amendment, a class circular, a Saudi notice to mariners, or a pollution figure. It reprints a master’s RPG report and an incomplete survey. Keep Update 105 in the pack. Report to UKMTO. Do not invent a hull name, a 176-26, or an Update 106 to hold the file.
Do not recast Saturday as a Hormuz increment, as a rewrite of Update 105, as an ST 3 numbering, as a 174-26 merge, or as an IRGC boarding. The confirmed facts are Warning 175-26, ATTACK, 16 October 1922 UTC, master, tanker, RPG from a small boat, 78 nautical miles northeast of Al Jubayl, aft port quarter damaged, crew accounted for and safe, damage and environmental impact unknown, no hull name, JMIC still Update 105, IMO board still 113 as at 14 October.
What Operators Should Note
- Log a second numbered UKMTO attack, not a 174-26 increment. Warning 175-26. 16 October 2026, 1922 UTC. Master report. Tanker attacked by an RPG from a small boat 78 nautical miles northeast of Al Jubayl. Aft port quarter damaged. Crew accounted for and safe. Damage assessment and environmental impact unknown. UKMTO printed neither hull, IMO, flag, cargo nor attacker.
- Keep the two Saturday PDFs apart. 174-26 is 0900 UTC, time-late CSO, unknown projectile, 68 nautical miles, crew evacuated, no reported environmental impact at time of report. 175-26 is 1922 UTC, master, small-boat RPG, 78 nautical miles, crew still reported on board, survey open. Reuters could not say they were one casualty. Do not collapse them.
- Treat this as a night small-boat problem in the western Gulf. 1922 UTC is 2222 local. The weapon is an RPG from a boat, not an unknown projectile in the Hormuz TSS. Put small-boat reporting, citadel readiness and aft-quarter damage control on the Jubail / Ras Tanura passage plan. Report to UKMTO.
- Keep Update 105 in the master’s pack. Arabian Gulf remains MODERATE on the 15 October JMIC note. Saturday does not print Update 106 and does not move the IMO board off 113 as at 14 October. Do not treat two AG attack numbers as a new JMIC threat scale.
- Do not put a name or an attacker on the hull. No flag or class primary has named 175-26. Do not import Vanguard’s unresolved Safeen Principal colour from 174-26. Do not brief Iranian-facing IRGC headlines as the product. Wait for UKMTO, JMIC, the flag or the operator.
- Leave ST 3 and the Hormuz cluster on their dedicated pieces. ST 3 remains Friday’s India-ministry Hormuz naming. 171-26 remains the unnamed 13 October outbound tanker. Pride, Giselle and Al Saadiyat remain the dedicated 170-26 / 172-26 / 173-26 files. 175-26 is the new western-Gulf RPG number. Watch the next numbered warning, a JMIC Update 106, or a damage/pollution revision — not a Hormuz rewrite.
Regulas Shipping will keep lining Warning 175-26 against Warning 174-26 and Update 105’s still-MODERATE Arabian Gulf line so operators can treat Saturday night as a numbered small-boat RPG with aft damage, not as a second copy of the morning evacuation or a named-hull finding.
