Ships collide carrying jet fuel and toxic sodium cyanide causing multiple explosions.

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Images showed a huge plume of thick, black smoke and flames rising from the scene about 16 kilometres off the coast.
A spokesperson for UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the situation “extremely concerning”.
All crew members on board the tanker, owned by Swedish shipowner Stena Bulk, were confirmed to be alive.

A tanker carrying jet fuel for the US military was hit by a container ship off north-east England on Monday, with the collision igniting a blaze on both vessels, causing multiple explosions and forcing both crews to abandon ship.

The tanker, which can carry tens of thousands of tons of jet fuel, was at anchor when the smaller container ship struck it, rupturing its cargo tank and releasing fuel into the sea, its operator said.

Its owner, Stena Bulk, gave the same details.

Two maritime security sources said there was no indication of any malicious activity or other actors involved in the incident.

Local officials said the 32 injured had been met by ambulances, but by mid-afternoon only one remained in hospital.

The Stena Immaculate tanker, operated by US logistics group Crowley, was carrying Jet-A1 fuel when it was struck by the Portuguese-flagged cargo ship Solong while anchored near Hull, Crowley wrote on X.

The tanker is part of a US government program designed to supply the armed forces with fuel when required.

A spokesperson for UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the situation “extremely concerning”.

A US military spokesperson told the Reuters news agency on Monday it had been on a short-term charter to the US Navy’s Military Sealift Command.

The Solong is carrying 15 containers of sodium cyanide, a toxic chemical used mainly in gold mining, and an unknown quantity of alcohol, according to a casualty report from maritime data provider Lloyd’s List Intelligence.

Emergency teams sent a helicopter, fixed-wing aircraft, lifeboats and nearby vessels with firefighting capability to the incident on Monday.

“A fire occurred as a result of the allision and fuel was reported released,” Crowley said.

An allision is a collision where one vessel is stationary.

Crowley said there had been multiple explosions on board.

There was still a risk of environmental damage, experts said.

Martin Slater, director of operations at Yorkshire Wildlife Trust, said East Yorkshire’s coast was home to protected and significant colonies of seabirds including puffins and gannets, with many offshore on the sea ahead of the nesting season.

A Greenpeace spokesperson said any impact would depend on factors including the amount and type of oil carried by the tanker, the fuel carried by both ships, and how much of that, if any, had entered the water, plus the weather conditions.

Mark Sephton, professor of Organic Geochemistry at Imperial College London, added that the relatively small hydrocarbons of jet fuel could be degraded by bacteria more quickly than larger molecules.

“The fact that we are moving into warmer temperatures will also speed up biodegradation rates,” he said.

The incident occurred in a busy waterway, with traffic running from the ports along Britain’s northeast coast to the Netherlands and Germany, shipping industry sources said.