Skip to content

Subscriber Only

Vessels Change Names or Go Dark to Ship Venezuelan Crude to Cuba

Oil tanker Nedas sailed incognito for 42 days in April-May
U.S. continues to target shipments between the two countries

Photographer: Dana Smillie/Bloomberg

By

Lucia Kassai and

Ben Bartenstein

July 8, 2019, 9:54 PM UTCUpdated onJuly 9, 2019, 1:38 PM UTC

Stopping the flow of Venezuelan oil to its ally Cuba might prove harder than the U.S. expected.

Tankers are being renamed and vessels are switching off their transponders to sail under the radar of the U.S. government. The vessel Ocean Elegance, an oil tanker that has been delivering Venezuelan crude to Cuba for the past three years, was renamed Oceano after being sanctioned in May. The ship S-Trotter, another one that’s on the sanctions list, is now known as Tropic Sea, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.