Satellite Image Reveals Initial Venezuelan Oil Ship Confiscated by American Authorities is Currently Off the Texas Coast.
US personnel boarding the vessel of the tanker Skipper on December 10th.
Orbital data and vessel monitoring information has confirmed that the crude carrier Skipper – the first vessel seized by the United States for allegedly carrying embargoed oil from the Venezuelan regime – is now off the coast of Texas.
Vantor orbital photographs dated 21 December indicates the tanker is near the port of Galveston, while Automatic Identification System vessel-tracking feeds from a maritime data service currently places the vessel about 50 miles offshore.
The Skipper was taken into custody by American officials on the tenth of December and has been blacklisted by several governments. When it was intercepted, it was falsely sailing under the ensign of Guyana.
This seizure was followed by the capture of a another oil vessel, the Centuries tanker. This ship – unlike the first vessel – was not under sanctions when it was taken into American control.
US authorities are now pursuing a third such ship, which has been named by the maritime risk group Vanguard as the Bella 1 tanker. President Donald Trump said recently that “we’ll end up getting it”.
Writing on X, the maritime monitoring group noted the vessel Bella 1 has been “in transit for 39 days” and, at an typical pace of 11 nautical miles per hour, may have “another 28 to 35 days of diesel left unless her speed drops”.
The group added the vessel is “probably heading in a southeasterly direction towards South Africa”.
