Saudi Arabia halts key oil pipeline after a series of attacks

Saudi Arabia temporarily halted the strategic East-West oil pipeline after a series of attacks on its infrastructure in the Riyadh and Medina regions. The strikes caused fires and resulted in casualties. The pipeline is of particular importance to the global market as it is currently used to export Saudi oil bypassing the effectively closed Strait of Hormuz.

The Ministry of Energy of Saudi Arabia announced the pipeline shutdown on Friday, September 11. According to the ministry, the attacks occurred on Thursday morning. The pipeline was shut down as a precaution while emergency and technical services assess its condition and the safety of further operation.

The ministry reported injuries as a result of the attacks and that they received medical assistance, but did not specify the number or the nature of injuries. The timeline for resuming oil flows has not been announced.

Pumping stations under attack

According to CNN, citing two American officials, the East-West system was hit by unknown projectiles. A preliminary U.S. analysis indicates that the targets were pumping stations located directly along the pipeline.

A satellite image taken on Friday shows significant fire damage at one pumping station. At another facility, images taken a day earlier showed a small fire with thick black smoke.

Satellite systems on Thursday recorded nine major fire hotspots near the East-West route. At least six of them were located in areas of flare stacks used for emergency burning of oil and gas. Therefore, the thermal signatures alone do not mean that all these locations suffered direct hits.

There is currently no confirmation that the pipeline pipes themselves were damaged. American officials believe that restoring pumping stations may be easier and faster than repairing seriously damaged sections of the pipeline itself, but no repair timelines have been provided yet.

Who exactly organized the attack has not been officially established. One of the American officials told CNN that, according to an initial assessment, the strike was carried out by drones launched from Iraqi territory. Washington has so far not publicly named the group responsible for the attack.

Main route bypassing the Strait of Hormuz

The East-West Pipeline, also known as Petroline, runs for approximately 1,200 km across Saudi Arabia — from the oil infrastructure in the east of the country to the port of Yanbu on the Red Sea. Its total capacity is about 7 million barrels of oil per day.

The strategic role of the pipeline has sharply increased since the start of the U.S.–Iran war and the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Saudi Arabia rerouted about 5 million barrels per day through East-West that had previously been shipped by tankers from Persian Gulf ports.

Oil is now transported to the west of the country and loaded onto tankers in Yanbu. Thus, the pipeline has become one of the main routes allowing OPEC's largest exporter to continue supplying the global market without passing through the Strait of Hormuz.

Its shutdown creates an additional supply risk at a time when the alternative route via the Red Sea is also under pressure. Iranian-backed Houthis this week achieved major territorial gains in Yemen, capturing the port of Mocha and the island of Mayyun at the entrance to the Bab el-Mandeb Strait — another vital route for global trade and energy shipments.

The Houthis also threatened to attack Saudi vessels passing through Bab el-Mandeb. As a result, both routes on which regional oil exports depend are now simultaneously under pressure: the Strait of Hormuz in the east and the exit from the Red Sea through Bab el-Mandeb in the west.

This is not the first attack on the pipeline in 2026

East-West was already hit in the spring. On April 9, an attack on one of the pumping stations reduced the pipeline's capacity by about 700,000 barrels per day. Other Saudi energy infrastructure facilities were also attacked at that time, including oil fields and refineries.

By April 12, Saudi Aramco was able to fully restore East-West's capacity to approximately 7 million barrels per day. The current attack, judging by satellite images, affected several facilities of the system simultaneously, although no official assessment of the damage scale has been provided yet.

The new attack occurred against the backdrop of sharp escalation in the region. On September 8, Houthis launched large-scale missile and drone strikes on facilities in Abha, Jizan, Najran, and Khamis Mushait in southern Saudi Arabia. According to Saudi authorities, 73 people were injured, and fires broke out including at energy facilities.

Oil market remains under pressure

The threat to the pipeline has increased concerns about physical oil supplies from the Persian Gulf. This week Brent rose above $100 per barrel for the first time in a long period amid military escalation, shipping problems, and threats to key oil routes.

Saudi Arabia has not yet reported whether the current East-West shutdown has led to a reduction in its actual exports. The Ministry of Energy stated that technical specialists continue to assess the safety of the system and further changes will be announced separately.

Sources: CNN, Saudi Gazette, Saudi Press Agency.