US personnel boarding the vessel of the tanker Skipper on December 10th.
Satellite imagery and ship tracking data has confirmed that the crude carrier Skipper – the initial vessel seized by the US for reportedly carrying embargoed oil from Venezuela – is now positioned near of the state of Texas.
A satellite firm's satellite imagery dated 21 December shows the tanker is in the vicinity of the port of Galveston, while AIS ship-tracking data from MarineTraffic presently places the vessel about 50 miles from the coast.
The tanker Skipper was taken into custody by American officials on 10 December and has been sanctioned by multiple nations. At the time it was intercepted, it was falsely sailing under the flag of the nation of Guyana.
This interception was succeeded by the capture of a second tanker, the Centuries tanker. This ship – unlike the first vessel – was not yet under sanctions when it was taken into US custody.
US authorities are currently pursuing a third such vessel, which has been named by the maritime risk group Vanguard as the Bella 1 tanker. The US President stated recently that “we’ll end up getting it”.
Writing on X, the maritime monitoring group said the vessel Bella 1 has been “in transit for over a month” and, at an typical pace of 11 knots, may have “approximately a month of fuel remaining unless her velocity drops”.
The monitoring service added the vessel is “probably heading in a southeasterly direction towards South Africa”.
