Saudi Crude Oil Tanker Backlog at Ain Sukhna Begins to Clear

By Julian Lee (Bloomberg) —

A backlog of Saudi-owned supertankers that has built up off Egypt’s Red Sea coast is beginning to clear.

The number of the nation’s own tankers tankers anchored near Ain Sukhna, a port at the southern end of a pipeline linking the Red Sea to the Mediterranean has dropped to five, down from a peak of eight in mid-June, according to vessel tracking data monitored by Bloomberg.

They, along with two Chinese-owned vessels also carrying Saudi crude, have been waiting a mixture of days, weeks and months.

Tankers anchored there previously are discharging their cargoes, generally at a rate of one every two days and after a wait of between three and four weeks.

During the course of June the rate of new vessels arriving off the port slowed from one every other day early in the month to about one every four days toward the end.

No Saudi VLCCs have arrived off Ain Sukhna so far in July, but the Harad is due there on July 7 and the Khurais was last seen on July 2 taking on a cargo of Saudi crude at the Yanbu South terminal. Both vessels have previously shuttled cargoes between Yanbu and Ain Sukhna.

For more details on the vessels:

IMO	Name	Class	Arrived	Days anchored	Notes
9358292	Newton	VLCC	May 11	55
9358280	Noble	VLCC	May 15	51	U-turn in Indian Ocean after heading toward Japan
9484716	Niban	VLCC	May 28	22	Discharged on June 19
9858450	Samha	VLCC	May 31	21	Discharged on June 21
9332535	Wafrah	VLCC	June 01	22	Discharged on June 23
9220952	Harad	VLCC	June 03	24	Discharged on June 27
9783679	Khurais	VLCC	June 04	25	Discharged on June 29
9237797	Lulu	VLCC	June 06	27	Discharged on July 3
9384198	Manifa	VLCC	June 07	24	Discharged on July 1
9421415	Arsan	VLCC	June 11	24	Discharging
9336098	Layla	VLCC	June 17	18
9223887	Safwa	VLCC	June 21	14
9384239	Karan	VLCC	June 24	11
9484730	Nisalah	VLCC	June 28	7
9484716	Niban	VLCC	June 30	5