KHURAIS: Thedramatic weekend assault on two Saudi oil facilities saw one of the targetsstruck four times sparking fires that took five hours to extinguish, thenational oil company said Friday. At the Khurais plant in eastern Saudi Arabia,a charred web of pipes and supports was flanked by cranes as staff assessed theextensive damage to an oil stabilizer apparatus.
The US has blamedIran for the attacks, which have been claimed by Tehran-backed Yemeni rebels,condemning them as an "act of war" which knocked out half thekingdom's oil production. "There were more than 200 to 300 people insidethe facilities," said Fahad Al-Abdulkareem, a general manager at thestate-controlled Saudi Aramco oil company, as he inspected the damage.
The company flewin dozens of journalists, both local and foreign, on an Aramco jet to see theaftermath of the attacks which have ratcheted up tensions in the tinderboxregion. "The whole thing had happened, with four strikes and explosions,with no single injury to any of them," Abdulkareem said. Thick metalpiping was badly warped and peppered with shrapnel during the aerial strikesand lay strewn around the area of the attack. Saudi officials this weekunveiled what they said were fragments of 25 drones and cruise missiles firedat the two oil facilities yesterday.
Despite theextent of the damage, managers remain optimistic that production can be fullyrestored by the end of September. "An emergency team was assembled torestore the plant and the activities and bring the crude and the oil back.Within 24 hours, 30 percent of the plant was in production," saidAbdulkareem. "We will have production at the same level as before thestrike by the end of this month - we are coming back stronger."
Cyber attacks
Iran deniedyesterday its oil infrastructure had been successfully attacked by a cyberoperation, after reports of disruptions to the sector online. "Contrary toWestern media claims, investigations done today show no successful cyber attackwas made on the country's oil installations and other crucialinfrastructure," the government's cyber security office said. Thestatement did not specify which reports it was addressing.
NetBlocks, anorganization that tracks internet outages, tweeted yesterday that "networkdata show intermittent disruptions to internet connectivity in #Iran." Butit said the cause was unclear and impact limited, affecting "onlineindustrial and government platforms" and specific providers. "Dataare consistent with a cyber attack or unplanned technical incident on affectednetworks as opposed to a purposeful withdrawal or shutdown incident," itadded.
Iran'sTelecommunications Minister Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi has acknowledged in thepast that Tehran has "been facing cyber terrorism-such as Stuxnet."The Stuxnet virus, discovered in 2010, is believed to have been engineered byIsrael and the US to damage nuclear facilities in Iran. Iran at the timeaccused the US and Israel of using the virus to target its centrifuges used foruranium enrichment.- Agencies