U.S. forces destroyed what they said were 16 Iranian mine-laying ships in the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, as Iran continued to strike its neighbors, including in a drone attack near the main airport of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
On Tuesday, U.S. forces “eliminated multiple Iranian naval vessels,” the War Department’s Central Command (CENTCOM) wrote on X. The strikes included 16 minelayers near the Strait of Hormuz, CENTCOM said.
U.S. President Donald Trump on Tuesday warned Iran not to mine the Strait of Hormuz, a bottleneck along a major shipping route for petroleum that the ayatollah regime said would be closed.
The British army’s U.K. Maritime Trade Operations center said a cargo ship was hit by a projectile in the Strait of Hormuz on Wednesday, north of Oman. The vessel caught fire and the crew abandoned ship, the report said.
A 34-second video released by CENTCOM of the minelayers’ destruction shows infrared footage of American strikes on Iranian naval vessels identified as minelayers.
The black-and-white thermal imagery, likely from aircraft or drone sensors, shows bright flashes as munitions hit naval vessels. Several boats erupt in secondary explosions, with debris scattering and heat blooms spreading across the water. Some vessels appear stationary or moving slowly before being struck, after which they fragment, sink or are engulfed in fire.
The movement of oil tankers through the Strait dropped from around 50 per day on Feb. 28, when Israel and the U.S. launched their joint operation against Iran, to single digits in the following days and down to zero after March 8, according to The Economist’s Iran War Tracker.
The price of crude oil, which had hovered around $72 per barrel before Feb. 28, reached $113.13 on Wednesday, the Kuwait News Agency reported. Since March 1, the national average for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline in the U.S. has risen more than 55 cents, reaching $3.53 per gallon, according to an American Automobile Association update on Tuesday.
Separately, an Iranian drone attack injured four people near Dubai International Airport (DXB) on Wednesday, the Dubai Media Office reported. Two drones “fell in the vicinity” of the airport, the report said.
The United Arab Emirates has seen at least 21 hits by Iranian projectiles, with Israel registering a similar number, according to The Economist’s tally.
The army of Saudi Arabia, the Persian Gulf’s largest oil producer and military power, reported the interception and destruction of four drones in the eastern region of the kingdom on Wednesday.
The Kuwait National Guard shot down eight hostile drones in the areas under their jurisdiction, their spokesman, Brig. Jadaan Fadhel Jadaan, said Wednesday.
Seven U.S. servicemen have been killed in the war, along with 10 people in Israel and at least 14 people in Iran’s neighboring countries since Feb. 28.
Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have said the military operation in Iran, codenamed Epic Fury and Roaring Lion in the U.S. and Israel, respectively, was to neutralize Iran’s ability to threaten its neighbors and was designed to help the Iranian opposition bring down the ayatollah regime.
