Drillship Capsizes in Egypt’s Gulf of Suez

On July 1, 2025, the Adam Ocean 12, a barge belonging to Egypt’s state-owned oil company OSOCO, capsized while under tow, killing four people and leaving six missing. The vessel was transporting drilling equipment to a Saudi oil and gas block and was carrying 200 tons of diesel fuel and 30 tons of drilling fluid. Although the Egyptian Ministry of Petroleum claimed that there was “no large-scale leakage”, the environmental organization Red Sea Guardians detected concentrations of petroleum-based substances in the area of the incident that exceeded the limit by a factor of 1.5, and speculated that the slow leakage might have been caused by a hull breach.