Bab al-Mandab transits rose in October as monitors differ on how far traffic remains down
Adel Haddad 
ADEN, Yemen — Shipping through the Bab al-Mandab strait rose for a second month in October, Lloyd’s List Intelligence said, while naval monitors logged no attacks since August.
The maritime data provider recorded 1,363 cargo vessel transits through the strait in October, carrying 112.3 million deadweight tonnes, according to its Red Sea Transit Monitor.
September produced 1,215 transits and 95.7 million deadweight tonnes, the same monitor said. Its count covers cargo-carrying vessels above 10,000 deadweight tonnes.
October volumes were 43% higher than a year earlier, the company said. Tonnage through the strait grew 17% from September.
Lloyd’s List Intelligence also placed October traffic 46% below the levels recorded before Houthi attacks on merchant shipping began in late 2023.
A different measure is in circulation. The UK Maritime Trade Operations, a Royal Navy-run body that logs shipping incidents in the region, put Bab al-Mandab transits about 24% below pre-blockade levels in a weekly overview reported Saturday.
The two figures use different baselines. UKMTO compares current traffic with the period before the Houthis announced a blockade in July, while Lloyd’s List Intelligence measures against trade from before the attacks started.
The sources also differ on the date of that announcement. UKMTO gives July 22, Gulf News gave July 20 in reporting what it called a selective embargo, and a Maritime Gateway report placed it in July 2026 without a day.
Daily counts for early November run with the monthly data. An industry tracker cited by Gulf News recorded about 34 commercial transits a day between Nov. 1 and Nov. 4, against about 28 a day the previous week.
Daily movements across those four days were 38, 37, 35 and 26 vessels, the newspaper said. It did not name the tracker.
The strait links the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and carries traffic bound for the Suez Canal.
Security reporting over the same weeks was mixed. The Joint Maritime Information Centre logged one suspicious-activity incident in the southern Red Sea in an advisory dated Nov. 5 and distributed by UKMTO.
The centre gave the incident the reference MSCIO 168/26. It recorded no confirmed attack on a merchant ship in that period and said the area remained volatile.
The centre has also said Houthi targeting does not follow a consistent or predictable method.
Lloyd’s List Intelligence reported suspicious activity in the strait on Nov. 6, including a large explosion whose cause it said was unknown.
UKMTO has reported no attacks in the Red Sea since Aug. 24.
Container ships drove much of the October increase. Lloyd’s List Intelligence counted 426 boxship transits, against 315 in September and 230 in October 2025.
About half of those container ship passages were made with tracking systems switched off, the company said. It said boxships were operating in unconventional ways by going offline.
Suez Canal traffic reached what the company called a post-crisis high for a fifth consecutive month, at 1,338 transits and 125.6 million deadweight tonnes in October.
That was 63% above October 2025 and 34% below pre-crisis levels, it said. The company put the canal’s monthly average from January to November 2023 at 2,009 transits and 182 million deadweight tonnes.
Crude tanker tonnage through Suez reached 47.13 million deadweight tonnes in October, above the pre-crisis monthly average of 44.35 million, according to the company. It attributed the rise to geopolitical disruption rather than a return to earlier trading patterns.
More than a third of large crude tanker passages through the canal involved sanctioned ships, the company said.
Evergreen resumed Suez transits after an absence of close to three years, it said.
Lloyd’s List Intelligence described the October figures as its clearest indicator of recovery to date, while saying conditions in the corridor were not normal.
Yemeni authorities and insurers have disputed the standing of the Houthi body that issues transit assurances. The Humanitarian Operations Coordination Center was set up by the group in early 2024.
Skuld, a marine insurer, has said the centre has no internationally recognised authority to impose transit conditions. The Yemen Maritime Affairs Authority in Aden has advised vessels not to deal with it.
The centre’s website says decisions on completed transit requests may take up to 24 hours.
Houthi statements have said non-Saudi commercial vessels may transit safely.
The longer route around southern Africa remains the alternative. The International Monetary Fund found Suez trade fell about 50% year on year in the first two months of 2024, while traffic around the Cape of Good Hope rose an estimated 74%.
Those figures describe the initial disruption rather than current volumes.
Piracy off Yemen has continued separately from the Houthi campaign. The fishing vessel Azini was hijacked on Oct. 29 and reported freed on Nov. 2, Gulf News said.
The tanker Asana, seized on July 17 about 65 nautical miles southwest of Mukalla, remained in hijackers’ hands, according to the same report.
A warning over a suspected pirate action group in the Gulf of Aden ran until Nov. 3.
EUNAVFOR Aspides, the European Union naval mission in the region, has told member states what forces it requires, Lloyd’s List Intelligence said.
The company said it would publish its Red Sea brief every two weeks rather than weekly unless circumstances changed.
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