Fires observed on board Greek-flagged tanker in Red Sea, says maritime agency

CAIRO (Reuters) -Three fires blazed on a Greek-flagged oil tanker in the Red Sea, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations said on Friday, one day after rescuers evacuated its crew in the wake of an assault by Yemeni Houthi militants.

The Iran-aligned Houthis, who control Yemen's most populous regions, said on Thursday that they had attacked the Sounion oil tanker as part of their 10-month campaign against commercial shipping to support Palestinians in the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.

The Houthis first damaged the tanker on Wednesday with repeated attacks that caused a fire and a loss of engine power. A European warship later rescued her crew of 25. The uncrewed vessel was anchored between Yemen and Eritrea, a maritime security source told Reuters on Thursday.

On Friday, UKMTO said in an advisory that it had received reports of three fires on the vessel, which "appears to be drifting." Later in the day, the Houthis posted a video on social media that purportedly showed them setting the tanker on fire.

The damaged tanker, carrying 150,000 metric tons of crude oil, poses an environmental hazard, the EU's Red Sea naval mission Aspides said.

"A potential spill could lead to disastrous consequences for the region's marine environment," the Djibouti Ports & Free Zones Authority said in a post on the social media site X on Friday.

The largest recorded ship-source spill was in 1979, when about 287,000 tonnes of oil escaped from the Atlantic Empress after it collided with another crude carrier in the Caribbean Sea off the coast of Tobago during a storm, according to International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation.

The Sounion was the third vessel operated by Athens-based Delta Tankers to come under Houthi attack this month.

The Houthis said it attacked the tanker in part because Delta Tankers' violated its ban on "entry to the ports of occupied Palestine," Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree said in a televised speech.

"Delta Tankers is doing everything it can to move the vessel (and cargo). For security reasons, we are not in a position to comment further," the company said in a statement on Friday. 

(Reporting by Ahmed Tolba and Hatem Maher in Cairo, Renee Maltezou in Athens and Lisa Baertlein in Los Angeles ; Editing by Louise Heavens, Jonathan Oatis and Cynthia Osterman)