Imagery Data Reveals First Venezuelan Tanker Confiscated by American Authorities is Now Off Texas.
US personnel roped onto the vessel of the tanker Skipper on 10 December.
Satellite imagery and ship tracking data has verified that the oil tanker Skipper – the first vessel seized by the United States for reportedly transporting embargoed oil from the Venezuelan regime – is now positioned near of Texas.
Vantor orbital photographs dated 21 December shows the tanker is near Galveston, while Automatic Identification System ship-tracking data from MarineTraffic presently places the vessel about 50 miles from the coast.
The Skipper was taken into custody by US authorities on the tenth of December and has been blacklisted by several nations. When it was intercepted, it was incorrectly flying the ensign of Guyana.
This seizure was followed by the capture of a another tanker, the Centuries. It – in contrast to the first vessel – was not yet under sanctions when it was brought under US custody.
US authorities are currently pursuing a third vessel, which has been named by the risk management group a risk firm as the Bella 1 tanker. The US President said yesterday that “we’ll end up getting it”.
Writing on X, the TankerTrackers group said the Bella 1 has been “in transit for over a month” and, at an average speed of 11 nautical miles per hour, may have “approximately a month of fuel remaining unless her velocity drops”.
The group further stated the vessel is “probably traveling in a southeasterly direction towards the South African coast”.
