VesselsValue AIS shows that the 76,500dwt bulk carrier has continued on its voyage, and is currently steaming in a southeasterly direction at 11knts.
AIS reports that the vessel left Vila Do Conde Port in Brazil on 11 January and transited the Suez Canal on 6 February heading for Bandar Imam Khomeini in Iran.
The master reported to the UK Maritime Trade Operations website that the vessel had been attacked using two missiles and had “suffered minor damage, there were no crew casualties.
According to Houthi armed forces spokesman Yahya Sare’e: “The naval forces of the Yemeni Armed Forces targeted the American ship ‘Star Iris’ in the Red Sea with a number of suitable naval missiles, and the strikes were accurate and direct.”
Sare’e said the attack on the vessel was in response to Israeli aggression in Gaza. Another Star Bulk vessel, Star Nasia, was targeted by Houthis in an attack on February 6.
Star Bulk Carriers Corporation is listed on the New York stock exchange Nasdaq and recently announced its merger with the Stamford, Connecticut, headquartered Eagle Bulk Shipping, creating a $2.1 billion mega-carrier operating a fleet of 169 bulk carriers.
Star Bulk's merger partner has its own experience of the current danger in the Red Sea; Eagle Bulk's ultramax Gibraltar Eagle was struck by a Houthi anti-ship ballistic missile in the Red Sea en route to the Suez Canal on January 15.
Shareholders of the Athens, Greece, headquartered Star Bulk will own 71% of the combined entity’s stock with the remaining 29% going to Eagle Bulk investors.
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