| Date | 28 Feb 2026 |
| Tracker | Strait of Hormuz Tensions |
| Type | Strike |
| Location |
Bandar Abbas, Iran
27.20, 56.29 (approximate) |
On the opening day of Operation Epic Fury, US strikes sank or destroyed much of Iran's surface fleet at its moorings in Bandar Abbas and Konarak naval bases, at the northern shore of the Strait of Hormuz. Commercial shipping reacted within days: AIS transit calls through the strait, which had averaged around 70 ships per day in the preceding weeks, fell by more than ninety percent in March as insurers withdrew cover and operators rerouted or held cargoes. According to Janes, the strikes amounted to the effective demise of Iran's conventional navies as a fighting force.
| Series | That day | Prior 30-day avg | Week after vs before |
|---|---|---|---|
| Transits | 57 -27% | 78.3 | -87% (679 → 90) |
| Tankers | 36 -17% | 43.4 | -88% (377 → 44) |
| Cargo ships | 21 -40% | 34.9 | -85% (302 → 46) |
| Date | Type | Incident |
|---|---|---|
| 13 Apr 2024 | Interception | Iranian commandos rappel from helicopter to seize container ship MSC Aries near Strait of Hormuz |
| 14 Nov 2025 | Interception | Iran's IRGC seizes Marshall Islands-flagged tanker Talara off Khor Fakkan |
| 12 Jul 2026 | Strike | US sea drones strike Bandar Abbas submarine base in first combat use of armed USVs |
| 23 Jul 2026 | Diplomatic | Germany withdraws minehunters positioned for a Hormuz clearing mission |
IMF PortWatch data published on GMN's Strait of Hormuz tracker shows commercial ship transits averaging 3.17 a day over 1-6 September 2026, against 85.5 a day in 2025; other counters read higher, but every independent count is a small fraction of the pre-war norm.
Iran's Revolutionary Guard said on 8 September 2026 it had recovered a US Navy Anduril Dive-LD autonomous underwater vehicle at the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz; US Central Command said the vehicle had malfunctioned more than a day earlier, and Anduril confirmed the loss.
The United States decommissioned its four Bahrain-based Avenger-class mine hunters in September 2025 and shipped the hulls home in January 2026. When Iran began mining the Strait of Hormuz two months later, according to CENTCOM, the Navy had to sail two of its last four minesweepers from Japan.