Maritime Jewel
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The Maritime Jewel is a double hull oil tanker built in 2000; its length is 332 meters and its width is 58 meters. It was known as the Limburg until 2003.
[edit] Bombing
On October 6, 2002, the Limburg was carrying 397,000 barrels of crude oil from Iran to Malaysia, and was in the Gulf of Aden off Yemen to pick up another load of oil. It was registered under a French-flag and had been chartered by the Malaysian petrol firm Petronas.
While it was some miles offshore, an explosives-laden dinghy rammed the starboard side of the tanker and detonated. The vessel caught on fire and approximately 90,000 barrels of oil leaked into the Gulf of Aden.
One crew member, a 38 year-old Bulgarian named Atanas Atanasov, was killed, and 12 other crew members were injured. The fire was put out, and four days later the Limburg was towed to Dubai, United Arab Emirates. The damage to the tanker was around $45 million USD. The ship was sold to Tanker Pacific by 2003 under the new name Maritime Jewel who repaired it for $8.5 million USD.
Al Qaeda claimed responsibility for the attack on the Jehad.net website, which has since been shut down. Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who also planned the USS Cole bombing, is thought to have been the mastermind of the attack. Although Yemeni officials initially claimed that the explosion was the result of an accident, later investigations found traces of TNT on the damaged ship.
On February 3, 2006, Fawaz Yahya al-Rabeiee, who had been sentenced to death for the Limburg attack, and 22 other suspected or convicted Al-Qaeda members escaped from jail in Yemen. Jamal al-Badawi, who masterminded the USS Cole bombing of October 12, 2000, was also among the escapees, in total thirteen of whom had been convicted of the Cole and Limburg bombings. [1]
On October 1, 2006, Fawaz Yahya al-Rabeiee and Mohammed Daylami were shot and killed by Yemeni security forces during raids on two buildings in the capital Sanaa. One of al-Rabeiee's accomplices was also arrested during the raids. [[2]]
The attack on the Limburg inspired a important scene of the George Clooney movie Syriana.
