First ship of crude oil arrives amid Middle East war ceasefire

The first ship of crude oil has arrived in Bangladesh after the Middle East war. The ship named MT Ninemia anchored at Kutubdia Point of Chittagong Port this afternoon with 100,000 tonnes of crude oil. Two lighter tankers have been prepared in advance. Oil will be unloaded from the big ship into these smaller lighters.

The oil will then be brought to the port’s Dolphin Jetty and taken to the Eastern Refinery (ERL) through a pipeline. This crude oil is the main raw material to keep ERL operational. ERL refines it and produces 13 types of fuel including diesel, petrol and octane.

No crude oil ship has come to the country in the two months since the war began in Iran. The last crude oil ship anchored in Chittagong two and a half months ago on February 18. Due to insufficient raw materials, the deadstock accumulated in the pipeline was being used at ERL for one and a half months. During this time, production was reduced by two-thirds. The types of fuel were also reduced from 13 to two. In this way, ERL, which was on the verge of being completely shut down, is finally getting a new lease of life. This 100,000-tonne crude ship arrived from Yanbu port in Saudi Arabia.

Initiatives have been taken to bring another tanker named MT Fossil with another 100,000 tonnes of crude oil for refining at ERL. The ship will be loaded with crude oil at the Fujairah port in the United Arab Emirates on May 10. The ship has already set off for the Emirates. If everything goes according to plan, it could also arrive this month. If that happens, a total of 200,000 tonnes of crude oil could arrive this month.

As usable crude oil did not arrive on time, ERL’s production was kept operational on a very limited scale for one and a half months with deadstock oil in the pipeline. ERL officials say that a certain amount of oil has to be stored in the pipeline extending from the deep-sea floating buoy of the Single Point Mooring (SPM) project to the storage tank in Maheshkhali and from there to the ERL. The minimum amount of oil that remains inside to maintain the functionality and hydraulic pressure of the pipeline is called deadstock or bottom oil. This oil is usually not extracted. Considering the emergency situation, the refinery has been operating with that oil for some time now.

Commodore M Mahmudul Malek, Managing Director of Bangladesh Shipping Corporation, said that the 100,000-tonne crude oil-carrying ship MT Ninemia has anchored in the country from Yanbu port in Saudi Arabia. If everything goes well, ERL will resume full production from May 7.

BSC’s General Manager (Chartering and Operations) Captain Md. Mujibur Rahman said that there is a plan to bring another ship named MT Fossil to Bangladesh from Fujairah port by the end of this month. This tanker ship is on its way to Fujairah port. He said that if crude can be loaded from Fujairah, it will no longer need to be brought via Hormuz. It can be brought directly to Bangladesh from Fujairah via the Indian Ocean. MT Fossil is a Panamanian-flagged ship. Its length is 249 metres, width is 44 metres and draft is 14.9 metres. The deadweight of the ship is 115,760 tonnes. The ship was renamed Fossil in 2024. Earlier, the ship was named Fos Picasso.

A tanker ship named Nordic Pollux has been stranded in the Strait of Hormuz since April 5 due to the threat of an attack. It loaded 100,000 tonnes of crude from Ras Tanura, Saudi Arabia. Even after two months, no one can say for sure when the ship will set sail for Bangladesh. Another tanker ship named Omera Galaxy cancelled its Bangladesh-bound voyage due to the owner’s reluctance to send the ship to the war zone. This created a crisis of crude oil at the Eastern Refinery. The refinery was on the verge of closure.