Shell's Falcon 7X lands at Shu'aiba the week Hormuz traffic resumes

Shell's aircraft, a Dassault Falcon 7X bearing Cayman Islands registration VQ-BXH, was tracked on a brief 26-minute flight from Shaibah Air Base to Shu'aiba Airport on June 28. The distance between the two Iraqi Basra-area airfields is barely 50 miles, suggesting a positioning move or a short hop into the industrial zone near the Persian Gulf.

If Shell executives were aboard, the landing coincides with a sudden flurry of shipping activity through the Strait of Hormuz. Per a Reuters report on June 22, oil and LNG tankers are again transiting the waterway after Iran lifted a blockade under a 60-day ceasefire with the United States. Four Qatari LNG tankers entered the strait the same day, while state producer QatarEnergy issued its first crude sell tender since the war began, according to the Times of India. Shell's LNG train at Ras Laffan remains idle pending safe passage through the strait, and Pearl GTL Train 2 requires a year and $500 million to repair, as noted in Shell's May earnings call.

The aircraft has been unusually active around the Persian Gulf over the past week, with prior legs tracing routes from the UK and the Netherlands into Shaibah Air Base. If the flight signals Shell's return to on-the-ground assessments, it would follow CEO Wael Sawan's May statement that he visited the Pearl site and that all debris had been removed. The ramp-up at Hormuz may finally give the company a reason to step back in.