A Greek tanker set ablaze by the Houthis with more than a million barrels of oil aboard has been safely towed through the Suez Canal, the waterway’s authority said Monday.
“The oil tanker Sounion was successfully towed by four tugboats” through the Egyptian waterway and was now “heading to Greece”, Suez Canal Authority chief Osama Rabie said in a statement.
The Sounion was attacked in the Red Sea last August by Yemen’s Houthi militia, catching fire and losing power before its 25-member crew were rescued by a French frigate.
Its cargo could have created a catastrophic environmental disaster.
Had the Sounion broken up or exploded, it could have caused an oil spill four times larger than that caused by the Exxon Valdez in 1989 off Alaska, experts said at the time.
The final leg of the vessel’s journey comes after a months-long operation to transfer its cargo of 150,000 tons of crude to another tanker in Egypt’s port of Suez, where it was safely towed a month after being set on fire.