{"id":1146,"date":"2026-10-30T23:38:02","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T23:38:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/regulasshipping.com\/blog\/navarea-ix-420-26-records-oil-tanker-riti-on-fire-northwest-of-ras-tahir\/"},"modified":"2026-10-30T23:38:02","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T23:38:02","slug":"navarea-ix-420-26-records-oil-tanker-riti-on-fire-northwest-of-ras-tahir","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regulasshipping.com\/blog\/navarea-ix-420-26-records-oil-tanker-riti-on-fire-northwest-of-ras-tahir\/","title":{"rendered":"NAVAREA IX 420-26 records oil tanker RITI on fire northwest of Ra’s Tahir"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Hydrographer of Pakistan issued NAVAREA IX 420\/26 at 300300 UTC on 30 October for the Strait of Hormuz, charts BA 2851, 2888 and 3172 and Oman charts OM1219, OM302 and OM509. The official text states that oil tanker RITI is reported involved in a security incident causing fire onboard and anchored in 26-24.07N 056-24.72E, approximately 1 nautical mile northwest of Ra\u2019s Tahir, and cautions mariners. That is the working primary. It is a named fire-and-anchor product. It is not a new 30 October UKMTO Attack PDF, not a rewrite of Friday morning\u2019s dedicated Warning 187-26 attached-device Attack, and not an International Maritime Organization board increment past 121.<\/p>\n

Pakistan\u2019s Friday in-force table still carries 420\/26 as STRAIT OF HORMUZ \/ OIL TANKER INVOLVED IN A SECURITY INCIDENT. It does not print a wreck buoy, a light, a keep-clear radius, a least depth, a cargo grade, a bunker figure, a pollution line, a crew count, a flag, an IMO number or an attacker. Friday morning\u2019s dedicated 417\/26 piece on this desk, published about 11:41 UTC, still told operators that 420\/26 was an unused named tanker fire-and-anchor, held separately from the MSV Quba wreck. 420\/26 is now the dedicated file on that naming. Masters who brief Friday night as a second Quba, as a Louise 1 conversion, as a Lavan Island Attack, or as Update 110 will have merged four other series into a new Ra\u2019s Tahir plot.<\/p>\n

What the warning actually printed<\/h2>\n

The hydrographic text is short. DTG 300300 UTC OCT 2026. NAVAREA IX 420\/26. STRAIT OF HORMUZ. Charts BA 2851, 2888, 3172 and Oman OM1219, OM302, OM509. OIL TANKER (RITI) REPORTED INVOLVED IN A SECURITY INCIDENT CAUSING FIRE ONBOARD AND ANCHORED IN 26-24.07N 056-24.72E APPROXIMATELY 1NM NORTHWEST OF RA\u2019S TAHIR. MARINERS CAUTIONED. That is the product. Stay with that wording. The coordinator printed neither a wreck buoy, a light, a sinking clock, a cargo grade, a bunker figure, a pollution line, a crew revision, a keep-clear radius, a flag, an IMO number, nor an attacker. Do not invent a five-cable or one-nautical-mile circle around 26-24.07N 056-24.72E. 420\/26 does not print one. Do not invent an IMO number. The notice prints RITI. It does not print an IMO.<\/p>\n

The type line on the NAVAREA is oil tanker, and the name line is RITI. That is the first briefing fact. Friday morning\u2019s dedicated 187-26 PDF printed \u201ctanker,\u201d not a name. Friday evening\u2019s dedicated 188-26 PDF printed \u201cvessel,\u201d not tanker and not a name. 420\/26 is the first official hydrographic instrument on this Friday clock that types the casualty as an oil tanker and names it. Do not convert Friday\u2019s fire-and-anchor notice into a dhow finding. Do not put MSV Quba, Louise 1, Ghana Prosperity or Cape Dao onto this plot because those names are easier to brief than RITI. Do not put Friday evening\u2019s unnamed Lavan Island vessel onto this plot because both files print fire.<\/p>\n

The geometry is the second briefing fact. 26-24.07N 056-24.72E sits approximately 1 nautical mile northwest of Ra\u2019s Tahir on the Musandam side of the Strait of Hormuz, on BA 2851 \/ 2888 \/ 3172 and OM1219 \/ OM302 \/ OM509. That is not 26-19.95N 056-16.82E, Friday morning\u2019s dedicated Quba wreck 3.5 nautical miles west of Jazirat Um Al Ghanam. That is not 25 nautical miles northeast of Khasab, Friday morning\u2019s dedicated 187-26 Attack. That is not 40 nautical miles south of Lavan Island, Friday evening\u2019s dedicated 188-26 Attack. One named tanker. One plotted anchorage. Not a proof that 187-26 or 188-26 was RITI. Do not move Cape Dao\u2019s 15-nautical-mile northeast-of-Khasab IMO row onto this Friday plot because both files sit off Musandam. Cape Dao remains IMO 9219020, 23 September, 15 nautical miles northeast of Khasab, sunk on the IMO board, wreck later plotted 35 nautical miles east of Sohar on dedicated 403\/26 and later cancelled by 410\/26. RITI is a different name, a different type line and a different date.<\/p>\n

Anchored, fire onboard and mariners cautioned is the third briefing fact. 420\/26 does not say the ship is under way, continuing to the next port of call, NUC, under tow, or sunk. It does not say the fire is out. It does not say the crew are onboard or off the ship. A DPA who briefs Friday night as \u201cRITI continuing, fire extinguished, all well\u201d has borrowed 187-26\u2019s continuing-voyage line and has dropped the anchored line that is the whole of this NAVAREA. A DPA who briefs Friday night as a completed wreck because the tanker is on fire has over-read a mariners-cautioned anchorage that does not print sunk.<\/p>\n

Oman Maritime Security Centre colour of the same clock, held separately: Anadolu Agency, Dawn, DPA and Al Jazeera quote the Centre and the Royal Oman Navy as evacuating 25 crew from a Panama-flagged commercial vessel named RITI \u2014 AA printed RIT1 \u2014 after the ship was targeted and a fire broke out onboard off Musandam. AA gives about 1.6 nautical miles off the Musandam coast, which sits next to the NAVAREA\u2019s 1-nautical-mile northwest-of-Ra\u2019s Tahir offset. Dawn\u2019s 106-nautical-mile Musandam offset is a garbled reprint of that same statement; it is not on 420\/26 and it is not the working distance. The Centre said the crew received medical care and did not say whether anyone was injured, whether the fire was out, or who was responsible. Al Jazeera, citing MarineTraffic, adds crude oil tanker as open-register colour. Those extras are not on the NAVAREA. 420\/26 printed oil tanker RITI, fire, anchored, 26-24.07N 056-24.72E. It printed no flag, no crew count, no evacuation, no Panama line and no IMO. Treat the Oman Centre\u2019s 25-crew \/ Panama \/ targeted lines as coastal-state colour. Do not collapse them onto 420\/26 as a NAVAREA naming of flag, crew or weapon.<\/p>\n

What this is not<\/h2>\n

This is not a rewrite of 187-26, and it is not a UKMTO Attack PDF. Friday morning\u2019s dedicated Warning 187-26 Update 001 remains an unnamed outbound tanker Attack, 2212 UTC 29 October, 25 nautical miles northeast of Khasab, port-side small boat, two explosive devices attached above the waterline, engine-room fire, temporarily disabled, fire extinguished, crew safe, no environmental impact, continuing to next port of call. 187-26 prints continuing, not anchored, and prints no name. 420\/26 prints RITI, anchored and fire, and prints no method. Twenty-five nautical miles northeast of Khasab is not 1 nautical mile northwest of Ra\u2019s Tahir. Do not convert RITI onto 187-26 as a UKMTO naming. Do not convert 187-26\u2019s continuing-voyage line into 420\/26\u2019s anchored line. Vanguard\u2019s Louise 1 \/ Panama \/ about 159,092 dwt colour remains industry colour on the 187-26 piece, not a 420\/26 naming.<\/p>\n

This is not a rewrite of 188-26, and it is not a Lavan Island file. Friday evening\u2019s dedicated Warning 188-26 remains an unnamed vessel Attack, 1800 UTC 30 October, 40 nautical miles south of Lavan Island, Iran, unknown projectile on the port side, fire onboard, crew reported safe, no reported environmental impact at this time, location footer Lavan Island. Forty nautical miles south of Lavan Island is Arabian Gulf water, on the order of 150 nautical miles west of Ra\u2019s Tahir. An unnamed vessel is not oil tanker RITI. Do not merge Friday evening\u2019s Gulf Attack onto Friday\u2019s Hormuz NAVAREA because both print fire and a 30 October clock.<\/p>\n

This is not a rewrite of 186-26, and it is not Friday\u2019s companion dhow wreck. Thursday afternoon\u2019s unused Warning 186-26 remains a CSO Attack: tanker struck by an unknown projectile at 1600 UTC whilst completing an outbound Hormuz transit, no reported injuries, no environmental impact report, location footer Khasab, Oman. 186-26 still prints no name. Do not collapse 186-26 onto RITI unless a later UKMTO PDF, flag or class note prints RITI against the 1600 UTC clock. Friday morning\u2019s dedicated NAVAREA IX 417\/26 remains the working wreck instrument on dhow MSV Quba, MNV 2183, reported sunk in 26-19.95N 056-16.82E, about 3.5 nautical miles west of Jazirat Um Al Ghanam. A sunk dhow is not an anchored oil tanker. 26-19.95N 056-16.82E is not 26-24.07N 056-24.72E. Do not put Quba on the RITI plot. Do not put RITI on the Quba plot.<\/p>\n

This is not an IRGC mine confirmation, and it is not Update 110. Same-day IRGC statements, as carried by Al Jazeera and other wires, claimed three oil tankers were halted on an \u201cunauthorised\u201d southern Hormuz route, including a supertanker explosion and fire after a mine. CENTCOM has previously denied mine claims on this campaign; this desk is not treating Friday\u2019s IRGC tape as a 420\/26 fact. 420\/26 prints security incident, fire, anchored. It does not print a mine, a route, or an attacker. JMIC Update 109, JMIC# 001 26, ICOD 291300 UTC 29 October, remains the last numbered public periodic note, with Hormuz SEVERE, the Arabian Gulf SUBSTANTIAL, the Gulf of Oman MODERATE and 160 incidents since 1 March. 420\/26 at 300300 UTC sits after that cut-off. It is not on that note. The IMO highlighted-incidents board is still 121 confirmed \/ 24 seafarer fatalities as at 27 October, with Leonora Kosan still the newest named row. 420\/26 does not fill those slots and does not print an IMO number. Wednesday afternoon\u2019s dedicated JMIC Advisory Note 016-26 remains the blockade visit-and-search document pack. 421\/26 on Friday\u2019s Pakistan table is self-cancelling housekeeping (cancel 325\/26). 422\/26 is a southern-Gulf dhow sailing race. 418\/26 and 419\/26 remain self-cancelling housekeeping. None of those numbers is this tanker. This is not Thursday\u2019s dedicated Contship Jet or Khoryv Black Sea files. NAVWARN 768\/26 and 766\/26 are Kaliakra and Shabla products. They do not belong on a Ra\u2019s Tahir caution.<\/p>\n

Operational implications<\/h2>\n

For a master already in the Strait of Hormuz, shaping an outbound or inbound transit past Musandam, or working Khasab, Bukha, Limah, Fujairah or Khor Fakkan this evening, Friday is a named, positioned oil-tanker fire 1 nautical mile northwest of Ra\u2019s Tahir before it is a war-risk rewrite. Update 109 remains the last numbered JMIC note and still prints Hormuz SEVERE. 016-26 remains the working blockade document pack: continuous VHF 16, follow US forces, be prepared to alter, stop or come dead in the water, and have the six signed-or-stamped PDFs ready. 420\/26 adds a plotted obstruction and a fire on BA 2851 \/ 2888 \/ 3172 and OM1219 \/ OM302 \/ OM509 where Friday morning\u2019s 187-26 file still had an unnamed continuing tanker and no lat\/long. A passage plan that only carried the 25-nautical-mile northeast-of-Khasab offset, or that treated Musandam as clear because 410\/26 cancelled the Pride \/ Cape Dao \/ Ghana Prosperity cautions, has not budgeted 26-24.07N 056-24.72E.<\/p>\n

Mariners cautioned is the printed instruction, not a harbour closure and not a buoyed wreck. 420\/26 does not close Khasab, Bukha, Limah, Fujairah, Khor Fakkan or the Strait of Hormuz. It does not mark the tanker. It does not say the hull is on the bottom. It does not give a least depth. Night transits, restricted-visibility transits and any traffic that has been hugging the Omani coast to stay off the Iranian-controlled northern Hormuz route now carry a named oil tanker on fire, at anchor, on the Ra\u2019s Tahir offset. Plot the position, add sea-room beyond a default CPA, and keep a lookout for smoke, unlit boats and other traffic standing off the same plot. Do not invent a five-cable circle because Khoryv\u2019s dedicated 766\/26 prints one in the Black Sea. That radius is not this notice.<\/p>\n

A pollution watch and a crew watch remain open because the instrument is silent. 420\/26 prints fire, anchored and mariners cautioned. It does not print a hydrocarbon line, a boom, a cargo grade or a bunker figure. It does not print a crew count. Oman Centre colour, held separately, adds 25 crew evacuated and medical care and still does not print a spill or a fire-out line. That is not a clean bill. An oil tanker that burned and then sat at anchor 1 nautical mile off Ra\u2019s Tahir can leave fuel, can still be burning, and can still be a boarding or salvage problem. Charterers and P&I will ask for 26-24.07N 056-24.72E, the 1-nautical-mile northwest-of-Ra\u2019s Tahir offset, the RITI naming, and the still-open IMO board that has not taken this hull. They will not be answered by Friday morning\u2019s unnamed 187-26 Attack alone. Flag, class and wreck-removal or salvage work remain with whoever holds the tanker. None of those names is on 420\/26.<\/p>\n

For a DPA and an operator with any merchant hull still using the southern Hormuz corridor, the reporting split is the operational content. Sightings of the tanker, smoke, persons in the water or pollution go to the NAVAREA \/ coastal-warning system, to UKMTO if the sighting is being treated as a live Attack, and to the company security officer. NAVCENT NCAGS remains the 016-26 blockade mailbox. MSCIO remains the EU ATALANTA registration and alert desk. Registering with one mailbox is not a substitute for the others. 420\/26 does not order an armed team, a daylight-only transit, or a halt to visit-and-search compliance. It also does not authorise a master to treat an anchored named tanker as a confirmed 187-26 attached-device Attack, a confirmed 188-26 Lavan projectile, or a Cape Dao rewrite. Log the NAVAREA number, the 300300 UTC clock, the name RITI, the oil-tanker type, the plot 26-24.07N 056-24.72E, the 1-nautical-mile northwest-of-Ra\u2019s Tahir offset, the fire-onboard line, the anchored line, and the mariners-cautioned line. Do not log an IMO number, a keep-clear radius, a Panama flag, a 25-crew evacuation, a mine, or an attacker that the notice does not print. Hold those Oman Centre extras as colour beside the log, not as the NAVAREA tape.<\/p>\n

Keep the dedicated files on their own lines. 188-26 remains Friday evening\u2019s unnamed vessel Attack 40 nautical miles south of Lavan Island. 187-26 remains Friday morning\u2019s unnamed tanker Attack 25 nautical miles northeast of Khasab. 417\/26 remains Friday morning\u2019s dedicated MSV Quba wreck. 186-26 remains the unused 1600 UTC unknown-projectile Attack. 185-26 remains Thursday\u2019s 9-nautical-mile north-of-Khasab fire sighting. 184-26 \/ 416\/26 remains the Gulf of Aden PAG keep-clear through 3 November. 183-26 remains the 26 October Al-Faw fire. 182-26 remains the 23 October outbound disablement, Ghana Prosperity on Update 109 as wrap only. 181-26 \/ Leonora Kosan remains Limah. 179-26 \/ Al Dasma remains Bukha. Cape Dao remains 403\/26 \/ the 23 September IMO row. Pride remains the 13 October container wreck. Update 109 remains the last periodic threat note, Hormuz still SEVERE. 016-26 remains Wednesday afternoon\u2019s blockade document pack. Thursday\u2019s 768\/26 and 766\/26 remain the Kaliakra and Shabla Black Sea files. Do not recast 30 October as a Louise 1 conversion, as a Lavan rewrite, as Update 110, as an IMO 122-count, or as a Hormuz closure.<\/p>\n

What Operators Should Note<\/h2>\n