Yemen’s Houthi forces on Monday said they fired a missile at and struck the facility. Saudi authorities later confirmed the attack, Reuters reported.
Aramco’s oil production and export facilities are mostly in Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province, more than 1,000 km from Jeddah.
One of the 13 tanks used for diesel oil, gasoline and jet fuel at Aramco’s North Jeddah Bulk Plant is currently out of action, the facility’s manager Abdullah al-Ghamdi told journalists on a tour.
Ghamdi said they were still assessing the scale and cost of the damage from the attack which happened at 3:50 am Saudi time on Monday.
He described the site as a “critical facility” with a total storage capacity of 5.2 million barrels. It can distribute more than 120,000 barrels of products per day domestically to Jeddah, Mecca and the al-Baha region.
A fire caused by the attack was extinguished in around 40 minutes with no casualties, he said.
“It was a big fire, a big explosion, but was dealt with swiftly,” Ghamdi said.
The projectile struck the storage tank, which has a maximum capacity of 500,000 barrels, from the top, causing “major damage” to its roof, with a hole around 2 metres square, the official said.
Black marks and some damage around its top rim were visible.
While yesterday, Saudi oil company Aramco claimed that the missile strike did not hit the target, an official at the Saudi Ministry of Energy on Monday night confirmed the attack by the Yemeni Ansarullah movement on an oil distribution station in northern Jeddah.
ZZ/PR
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