Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy says a second supertanker has slammed into a naval mine in the southern Strait of Hormuz, and the ship is now burning. According to the IRGC, the crude oil carrier suffered a powerful explosion in its engine room that sparked a major fire while it was trying to leave the strait. The Guards claim the vessel had switched off its navigation and AIS tracking systems and was taking an unauthorized and dangerous route in violation of Iran's navigation rules. Iranian officials say this is the third tanker to hit a mine on such a route since yesterday, and they issued a blunt warning that any ship ignoring the strait's regulations risks the same fiery fate.

The incident lands in one of the most tense waterways on the planet, where Iran has tightly controlled passage since the war began earlier this year and has threatened to treat any ship that goes dark on tracking systems as hostile, promising a forceful and decisive response. Almost everything about the mine claim so far comes from Iranian state-linked outlets, and it has not been independently confirmed, while the maritime monitoring body UKMTO separately reported that a tanker leaving the strait on Sunday was hit by an unidentified projectile. It was also not immediately clear who owned the burning ship or what happened to its crew. With so much of the world's oil moving through these waters, the big questions are who laid the mines, how many more may be out there, and how long shipping can keep gambling on this passage.