Saudi Arabia has temporarily shut a 1,200-kilometre pipeline recently carrying as much as five million barrels of oil daily, just as a Houthi territorial advance places its alternative Red Sea shipping route beside Africa under greater pressure.
Newly affiliated Houthi fighters shout slogans while attending a demonstration against Israel and in solidarity with Palestinians in Yemen in October.Mohammed Hamoud/
- Saudi Arabia has shut its East-West oil pipeline following drone attacks originating from Iraq.
- The 1,200-kilometre pipeline recently moved between four million and five million barrels daily.
- Houthis have separately captured Mayun Island inside the strait separating Yemen from Djibouti and Eritrea.
- The combined pressure could push more tankers towards Egypt or around South Africa’s Cape of Good Hope.
The East-West pipeline transports crude from Saudi Arabia’s eastern oilfields to the Red Sea port of Yanbu, allowing the kingdom to avoid the disrupted Strait of Hormuz.
Saudi Arabia’s energy ministry confirmed that it closed the pipeline as a precaution after drone attacks struck the kingdom on 10 September,Reuters reported.
TheFinancial Times reported that the government had not announced when operations would resume.
Although the pipeline lies entirely inside Saudi Arabia, the implications extend directly to Africa because Yanbu’s two escape routes depend on African geography.
Oil travelling south towards Asian markets must approach Bab el-Mandeb, the narrow passage between Yemen, Djibouti and Eritrea. Cargoes travelling north enter Egypt, where they can use the Suez Canal or the SUMED pipeline before crossing the Mediterranean and sailing around South Africa towards Asia.
That African connection has become more important after Houthi forces captured Mayun, also known as Perim Island, inside Bab el-Mandeb.
Houthis move inside the strait facing Africa
The Houthi capture of Mayun followed the group’s takeover of Mocha and advance through Dhubab on Yemen’s Red Sea coast.
Earlier, Mocha’s fall moved the Iran-aligned movement closer to Bab el-Mandeb.
Mayun takes that advance further. The island sits inside the strait itself, between Yemen and the African coast, and separates its two shipping channels.
The waterway is approximately 26 kilometres wide at its narrowest point. About 12% of global trade and as many as seven million barrels of oil daily normally pass through it.
Possession of Mayun therefore gives the Houthis a valuable position for observing or threatening ships entering the Red Sea from the Gulf of Aden.
Commercial traffic has not stopped completely, but the capture changes the security calculation for shipping companies, insurers and the African states across the water.
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Djibouti sits beside one of the world’s busiest maritime crossings and hosts military bases operated by countries including the United States, China, France, Italy and Japan. Eritrea’s coastline also faces the shipping corridor leading into Bab el-Mandeb.
A commercial ship navigates the narrow Bab el-Mandeb strait off the Horn of Africa, where the Houthi capture of Mayun Island has heightened security risks along the Red Sea shipping corridor. Stringer/Anadolu
For Egypt, any prolonged disruption threatens traffic heading towards the Suez Canal, one of the country’s most important
Saudi Arabia’s alternative to Hormuz is squeezed
The East-West pipeline became particularly valuable after fighting involving Iran restricted navigation through the Strait of Hormuz.
Hormuz normally carries about one-fifth of global oil supplies. Saudi Arabia responded to the disruption by sending more crude across the country to Yanbu.
The pipeline can transport approximately seven million barrels daily. Ship-tracking companies and analysts cited by Reuters estimate that it was recently carrying between four million and five million barrels per day.
That volume is equivalent to about 4% to 5% of global oil supply, explaining why the precautionary closure matters even before its full effect on exports is known.
The comparison describes the volume recently passing through the pipeline. Saudi Arabia could partly cushion the disruption with stored crude, other terminals or alternative shipping arrangements, particularly if operations resume quickly.
The shutdown follows an already difficult period for the kingdom. The International Energy Agency estimated that Saudi oil supply fell by 2.3 million barrels daily in August to six million barrels per day, its lowest level in more than three decades.
Egypt becomes the northern escape route
Saudi Arabia has increasingly moved Yanbu crude north rather than sending it south towards the Houthi-threatened passage.
Tankers can sail through Egypt’s Suez Canal or transfer oil through the 320-kilometre SUMED pipeline, which connects Ain Sokhna on the Red Sea with Sidi Kerir on the Mediterranean.
Loadings at Sidi Kerir reached a record 2.17 million barrels daily during one week in August, according to shipping data cited byReuters. Saudi crude accounted for approximately 90% of that volume.
This gives Egypt an important role in keeping Saudi oil moving. Yet Egypt also remains exposed to the same instability because prolonged danger in the Red Sea has already reduced the wider flow of ships towards Suez.
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Tankers could travel around South Africa
For Asian buyers, the northern route creates a remarkable diversion.
A tanker can leave Yanbu, sail north through Egypt, cross the Mediterranean and pass the Strait of Gibraltar before turning south along Africa’s Atlantic coast. It must then round South Africa’s Cape of Good Hope and travel east towards Asia.
Japan’s Idemitsu Kosan said voyages that usually took approximately 20 days were taking between 50 and 60 days because of the diversion,Reuters reported.
The longer journey consumes more fuel, occupies tankers for additional weeks and can increase freight and insurance costs. It also places African maritime infrastructure, from Egypt’s pipelines to South African bunkering ports, at the centre of Saudi Arabia’s struggle to reach Asian buyers.
The drone attack on the Saudi pipeline and the Houthi capture of Mayun remain separate developments.
Saudi Arabia and Iraq said the drones that struck the pipeline originated from Iraqi territory. The party responsible has not been conclusively identified.
What links the two events is their effect on the kingdom’s export choices, the land route to Yanbu has been suspended, while the shortest sea route from Yanbu to Asia now passes an island captured by the Houthis.
With Brent crude already above $100 per barrel, the duration of the pipeline shutdown and the response of shipping companies to Mayun’s capture will determine whether the disruption becomes another temporary shock or a more serious restriction on global oil movement.
