The United States has fired on and disabled a commercial cargo vessel in the Gulf of Oman while enforcing its naval blockade of Iran, the clearest escalation yet of at-sea interdiction in the Hormuz crisis. US Central Command said late Saturday, Nov. 7, that a US aircraft fired precision munitions at the stern of the St. Kitts-flagged M/V Huda, disabling the ship after CENTCOM forces directed the crew to abandon targeted spaces; the vessel had tried to depart regional waters after visiting an Iranian port and had ignored repeated warnings [1]. The UK Maritime Trade Operations centre said late Saturday it had received a report of an incident involving a bulk carrier and military forces about 18 nautical miles east of Khor Fakkan on the UAE coast [1]. The UAE National Guard said early Sunday that 22 people had been rescued from a cargo ship in the Gulf [1]. CENTCOM said that since July its forces have redirected 147 commercial vessels that complied with the blockade while disabling five merchant ships that refused, and that it had previously destroyed ten Iranian oil tankers tied to the IRGC's shadow network [1].

Tehran answered with its own claims at sea. The IRGC navy said on Sunday, Nov. 8, that two oil tankers — one east of the Strait of Hormuz and one inside the waterway — struck mines and caught fire after sailing an "unauthorised" route with their navigation and positioning systems switched off, and warned that any vessel cooperating with the US military would "inevitably hit a mine" [1]. Al Jazeera's live coverage put the number of tankers ablaze at three, describing "rogue oil tankers travelling an unauthorised route" hit by "explosions and severe fires" [2]. No maritime authority has confirmed the mine strikes, and the vessels have not been publicly identified.

The fighting is also widening around the strait's approaches. Explosions were reported on Qeshm Island late Friday, with the Tasnim agency reporting two missiles struck; President Trump later confirmed US forces had targeted an Iranian air-defence system, and further explosions were heard Saturday night at Qeshm, Sirik, Jask and Bandar Abbas [1]. CENTCOM has formed a task force to disrupt Iran's land supply routes [2]. Yemen's Houthis claimed strikes on King Khalid airport, Aramco storage tanks and a second barrage on the Abqaiq facility; Saudi Arabia confirmed an Aramco building in Riyadh was hit by shrapnel from an intercepted projectile, and Qatar condemned the attacks [2].

None of this points to a reopening. IMF PortWatch recorded just one vessel transiting Hormuz on Nov. 1, down from eight a day earlier and against a pre-crisis baseline near 85 a day; that print is a delayed Sunday figure, the week's quietest day. AIS still shows roughly 200 vessels moving inside the wider Gulf watch box, but those are not completed strait crossings, and neither the Iranian claims nor the US strike constitutes evidence that oil cargoes are passing Hormuz today.