Aged Oil Tanker Suggests Iran Is Bringing Back Retired Ships

By Weilun Soon

Apr 29, 2026 (Bloomberg) –A 29-year-old Iranian supertanker has appeared at Kharg Island after years off the radar, a sign that Tehran could be using retired ships to keep loading oil as its storage space runs out. 

The Nasha, built in 1997, is an Iran-flagged very large crude carrier. It was docked on Sunday at Kharg Island, Iran’s biggest oil-export terminal, according to satellite images reviewed by advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran and Bloomberg News.

Analysts from Vortexa and UANI said the vessel appears to have been re-mobilized after last delivering a cargo two to three years ago. It’s not entirely clear what Nasha had been up to since it was last seen — whether it was sailing or idled, or within or outside the Persian Gulf — as the vessel had stopped signaling its location. 

The US blockade means a growing number of tankers carrying Iranian oil remain stuck in the Persian Gulf or the Gulf of Oman, while other ships can’t sail through the Strait of Hormuz to pick up oil. As a result, Iran is fast running out of places to store its oil, with capacity likely to last for at most another three weeks at the current rate, research firm Kpler said this week.

Iran has proven itself to be able to endure significant economic pain, but the physical reality of having US warships in the Gulf of Oman will force it to find increasingly creative alternatives.

Reactivating Nasha — and ships like it — could buy Tehran some time to allow production to continue and to retain some storage space. The country has been known to tap on onshore and offshore capacity in a way that’s more dexterous than its neighbors before tanks are full. Last year, just days before Israel began pounding the country in June, Iran managed to ramp up loadings and move up to 2.33 million barrels a day.

Bloomberg News couldn’t immediately determine how many empty Iran-linked tankers are within the Persian Gulf or nearby and accessible. Analyst estimates suggest that, absent workarounds like Nasha, Tehran could soon be forced to shut in oil production.

Read More: US Dismisses Iran’s Ability to Handle Oil Backed Up by Blockade

“Reactivating vessels like this can help Iran in the short run, but the fundamental problem of the US blockade still exists as they struggle to bring in the ballast vessels,” said Xavier Tang, a senior market analyst at ship-tracking platform Vortexa Ltd. “The bigger question is perhaps when they will slow down their crude production.”

The US, meanwhile, has doubled down on its enforcement of the blockade introduced earlier this month, with US President Trump repeatedly suggesting Iran is on the verge of collapse.

“They don’t know how to sign a nonnuclear deal. They better get smart soon!” said Trump in a Wednesday post on Truth Social. “NO MORE MR. NICE GUY!”

In recent days, several Iran oil-laden supertankers were obstructed by the US Navy and forced to huddle off an Iranian port on the Gulf of Oman. That cluster now has 20 ships, compared to five on average before the blockade, the US Central Command said in a social-media post on Tuesday. 

Last week, satellite images showed 13 tankers, most of them VLCCs, anchored to the east of Kharg Island, roughly double the number seen the day before the blockade began on April 13. Inbound traffic into the gulf via the Strait of Hormuz remains near zero.

(Adds context in paragraphs five, six and Trump tweet in paragraphs nine and ten.)

© 2026 Bloomberg L.P.

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