US boards another runaway Venezuela tanker in Indian Ocean
VLCC Bertha was boarded and ‘captured’ after busting the US blockade on Venezuela
US forces boarded another tanker that escaped its shadow fleet ‘quarantine’ in the Caribbean, marking the 10th since boarding of a Venezuela-linked tanker since December
US FORCES boarded another tanker that escaped its blockade of Venezuela on Monday evening, marking the 10th such interdiction since the campaign against the Latin American country began in December, and the third one to take place in the Indian Ocean.
The US Department of War announced the action on social media platform X, with videos showing at least two helicopters boarding the US-sanctioned very large crude carrier Bertha (IMO: 9292163).
“Overnight, US forces conducted a right-of-visit, maritime interdiction and boarding of the Bertha without incident in the INDOPACOM area of responsibility,” the Department of War said.
“The vessel was operating in defiance of President Trump’s established quarantine of sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean and attempted to evade.
“From the Caribbean to the Indian Ocean, we tracked it and stopped it.”
The 2004-built Bertha has sparsely broadcast Automatic Identification System data since it was sanctioned by the US in December 2024. However, it broadcast several messages on Tuesday, indicating via its Maritime Mobile Service Identity number that it was flagged with the Cook Islands, but was likely doing so falsely.
According to the IMO’s GISIS database, Bertha is falsely flagged with Curacao.
Vortexa data shows that Bertha loaded about 1.8m barrels of heavy-sour crude in Venezuela Jose Terminal in early December.
Alluding to its other actions against blockade-busting tankers, the DoW said: “Three boats ran and now all three have been captured.”
