From the 47th floor of his Singapore apartment block, Remy Osman watches a 333m-long Iranian supertanker, laden with oil, slink through one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.
“It’s funny to think that the oil on that ship has nearly doubled in value since it set off two weeks ago,” said Osman, an amateur shadow fleet spotter, as the vessel passed a patrolling Singapore navy ship.
By using live-tracking apps and cross-referencing them with what he can see from his lofty position on the roof garden of his building, Osman was able to identify the vessel as an 18-year-old tanker named Huge that is flying under the Iranian flag. The ship has been on the US Office of Foreign Assets Control’s sanctions list since 2018 for its links to the National Iranian Tanker Company.