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Red Sea, Houthis

Bloomberg: Anchor dropped in Red Sea during Houthi attack likely damaged undersea cables 

The anchor was dropped to protect a ship under Houthi attack and accidentally hit the cables, and was thus not a deliberate attack on the international communications network.

Anchor. Illustration.

The cause of damage to three of over a dozen undersea cables serving as vital information conduits between Europe and Asia was likely a dropped anchor, according to Bloomberg.

The damage to the cables in the Red Sea area occurred when the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, who have been firing missiles and drones at any ship with even a tenuous connection to Israel, the US, or the UK fired on the Rubymar, which dropped anchor while under attack in the general area of where damage was done to the cables.

Per gCaptain, while the US is investigating whether the cables were deliberately sabotaged by the Houthis or damaged by accident by something like an anchor, the government of Yemen has expressed its fear that the Houthis might try and escalate its blockade of the Red Sea by targeting the cable network.

For their part, the Houthis have not claimed responsibility for the damage to the cable system, instead blaming the US and UK strikes against Houthi targets in retaliation for their attempted partial blockade of the Red Sea shipping route.
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