Ship traffic through Bab el-Mandeb fell on Sunday after Yemeni Houthis attacked Saudi oil installations along the Red Sea coast, while transit through the Strait of Hormuz stayed low over the weekend, shipping data from Kpler showed on Monday.
Eleven commodity vessels passed through the Bab el-Mandeb strait on Sunday, the lowest level in months, the data showed.
Red Sea traffic has been disrupted off the coast of Yemen since last week by the Tehran-aligned Houthis, who want to blockade Saudi exports, expanding the U.S.-Iran conflict that has already choked oil supply through the Strait of Hormuz.
Seven of the vessels that passed through Bab el-Mandeb were oil tankers with three of them entering the Red Sea. Two of them are very large crude carriers (VLCCs) heading to the port of Yanbu to load Saudi crude while the third is a Russian-linked ship, the data showed.
The four vessels that exited the Red Sea on Sunday included the Hong Kong-flagged VLCC New Explorer carrying 2 million barrels of Saudi and Emirati crude for eastern China's Ningbo port, a tanker carrying 1 million barrels of Russian crude for China and a tanker with about 750,000 barrels of Saudi crude onboard for Pakistan, the data showed.
This is the third Chinese VLCC to exit the Red Sea via the Bab el-Mandeb strait. Associated Maritime Hong Kong, the manager for the New Explorer, did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside office hours.
Houthi military spokesperson Yahya Saree said the group struck sites belonging to Saudi state oil company Aramco in the cities of Jizan and Yanbu on Saturday.
