OCEAN: Drone Attacks & more – 16th Dec 2025

Ahoy from BA! This is the Rorshok Ocean Update from the 16th of December twenty twenty-five. A summary of what's going down in the 70% surface of the Earth covered in saltwater.

Let’s kick off this edition with global trade. According to the UN Trade and Development or UNCTAD, Global trade hit a record 3.5 trillion dollars in twenty twenty-five, which is a 7% year-on-year increase.

Seaborne trade in goods and services was a key driver of growth. However, the UNCTAD forecasts that the increase in the fourth quarter will decelerate significantly.

From the regional perspective, East Asia and Africa are demonstrating strong growth. The overall trend indicates that South-South trade among developing economies has exceeded the global average, reflecting increasing resilience across emerging markets.

UNCTAD highlights that geopolitics will influence shipping routes. The trade distribution among key economies has become more concentrated. Factors such as high trade costs and geopolitical instability are expected to slow the growth of global trade expansion and impact cargo volumes.

In more news on cargo. According to an article by Weilun Soon, increased oil production, Western sanctions on Russian energy, and disrupted Red Sea shipping routes have led to longer shipping times, more ships being used, and a severe global oil tanker shortage.

To solve this problem, the new supertankers often sail empty on their maiden journey just to reach crude loading areas faster, instead of carrying refined fuels as they normally would. For example, six very large crude carriers delivered this year made empty trips from East Asia to pick up oil in the Middle East, Africa, or the Americas, compared to just one such trip last year.

Smaller tankers have also been pulled into crude trades, pushing up transport costs and freight rates.

Meanwhile, significant progress has been achieved in gender diversity. The French shipping company CMA CGM announced that it has doubled the number of female seafarers in the first year of the She Sails initiative.

The She Sails program launched in twenty twenty-four, focusing on recruitment, training, mentoring, and safer working conditions for women to improve gender diversity in maritime careers.

CMA CGM says the program is part of a broader commitment to inclusivity and long-term talent development, as the maritime sector faces global crew shortages and increasing pressure to modernize labor practices.

Let’s turn our attention to the U.S, as The Coast Guard has issued a rare Request for Proposals inviting commercial vessel operators to offer existing ships for lease or contract to quickly expand its fleet under a new industry partnership.

The proposal aims to add logistics and mission support vessels capable of quickly supporting Coast Guard operations across regions from the Caribbean to the Arctic. These vessels would operate under contracts lasting up to five years, with a budget ceiling of around ninety-nine million dollars. Vessels must stay at sea for over thirty days, have a 2,000-nautical-mile (about 3,700 kilometers) range, and handle containerized cargo. The proposal submission period ends in early January twenty twenty-six.

Apart from extending the military, the U.S. also started a tougher pressure campaign against Venezuela, as on Wednesday, the 10th, it. seized a large oil tanker off Venezuela’s coast.

US forces smoothly arrived on the deck of the sanctioned supertanker via a Black Hawk helicopter with ropes lowered. After confirming the seizure, President Donald Trump also noted that the U.S. is also doing other things, likely indicating military operations like land strikes.

Recently, the US has attacked Venezuela's suspected drug boats, leading to over eighty deaths during a military operation. These actions have raised legal questions and caused fears of a wider conflict.

In other news, Ukrainian naval drones struck and critically damaged a Russian-linked oil tanker in the Black Sea on Wednesday, the 10th, marking the third such attack in recent weeks on Russia’s shadow fleet.

The vessel flagged in the Comoros was en route to a Russian port when it was struck within Ukraine’s exclusive economic zone. This operation aimed to disrupt Russia’s oil exports that help fund the war. The attack has also caused a sharp increase in war insurance costs for ships navigating the Black Sea.

Russian President Putin promised retaliation and warned of cutting Ukraine off from the sea following Ukraine’s maritime drone attacks on Russian shadow fleet oil tankers.

It looks like Putin’s promise wasn’t just empty words, as on Friday, the 12th, Russian forces launched drone and ballistic missile strikes on two key Ukrainian Black Sea ports.

The attacks damaged three Turkish-owned commercial vessels, including a Panama-flagged cargo ship carrying food supplies. Firefighters were seen trying to put out a blaze aboard one vessel, and port infrastructure also suffered damage. No crew casualties were reported.

Ukrainian officials criticized the attacks, pointing out that Russia targeted civilian logistics rather than military targets

On Thursday, the 11th, the German Federal Fiscal Court barred authorities from selling or using an oil tanker or its cargo that had been seized off the Baltic Sea coast.

In January, a Panama-flagged tanker left Russia, drifting off Germany’s coast toward India with oil worth about forty-seven million dollars. German authorities suspect it could be part of Russia's shadow fleet used to evade EU sanctions. The tanker had previously won a lower-court case against customs officials trying to seize it. Even though customs officials appealed, the federal court upheld the initial ruling.

The Chinese coast guard and maritime militia ships fired water cannons towards twenty Filipino fishing boats in the South China Sea on Friday, the 12th.

China’s coast guard reported that the country had taken control actions against Philippine vessels, such as issuing warnings and compelling them to leave, but after the vessels disregarded multiple warnings, Chinese coast guard and maritime militia ships used water cannons against them. On the other hand, a Philippine official argued that the fishing boats were legally operating in the disputed waters, but Chinese forces intentionally detached them from their anchors.

Three fishermen were injured and two vessels suffered significant damage.

The Philippine Coast Guard has deployed vessels to stay near the fishing fleet, safeguarding their security and safety, while also supplying fuel and food to support their fishing activities.

On the other side of the earth, New Zealand rejected an application from NovaAlgoma Cement Carriers to operate a foreign-flagged vessel on a domestic coastal cement shipping route, upholding the country’s cabotage rules that protect coastal cargo services for New Zealand-flagged and crewed ships.

The Maritime Union of New Zealand and the International Transport Workers’ Federation see this as a victory for local employment and supply chain resilience, supporting a wider global acknowledgment of the need for robust maritime cabotage protections.

However, critics warn about higher coastal freight costs under strict rules.

Next up, an official from Papua New Guinea announced on Friday, the 12th, that Google plans to build three subsea cables in the country.

The cables will link northern and southern Papua New Guinea and the Bougainville autonomous region, reducing internet costs and improving connectivity.

The project is funded by the US and Australia and will be built by Google, aiming to improve the Pacific region's digital infrastructure. Military experts see these upgrades as part of broader efforts to counter China’s influence in the Pacific Islands region.

Two more cable systems are expected to extend to Africa and Asia, improving global network resilience.

And to close this edition, HD Hyundai Heavy Industries, the builder of the container ship Dali, said operator-made modifications to the ship’s fuel system and electrical settings compromised critical redundancy systems and caused the dual blackouts that left the vessel without power, propulsion, or steering just before it hit the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore. in March twenty twenty-four.

Originally equipped with multiple independent generators, transformers, and automatic fuel supply pumps, the ship’s design met classification standards. Hyundai alleges the owner replaced automatic fuel pumps with a manual flushing pump. Hyundai said that if the ship had operated as designed, power would have returned quickly, preventing the tragedy.

Aaand that’s it for this week! Thank you for joining us!

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See you next week!