The United States has imposed a naval blockade to block oil exports, but Iran continues to load supertankers to maintain production capacity.

Despite the US blockade on Iranian shipping, Iran continues to load millions of barrels of crude oil onto Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCCs), but as the US blockade continues, this operation will become increasingly difficult. Images taken by the EU's "Sentinel-1" satellite on Monday show a VLCC capable of loading around 2 million barrels of crude oil docked at the Kharg Island terminal. Earlier images taken on Saturday showed no vessels docked at Kharg Island. There is currently no evidence to suggest that large amounts of crude oil are bypassing the US blockade, so the crude oil already loaded likely fills the available tankers in the region. The images from Monday show 13 ships (mostly VLCCs) anchored on the eastern side of the island, while images from the day before the blockade (April 13) showed roughly half as many ships anchored. The US has stated that its naval blockade in the Gulf of Oman has prevented nearly 36 Iranian ships from passing, cutting off Iran's oil flow to buyers. The Trump administration is trying to sever Iran's crucial oil revenue, and market observers are closely watching how long Iran can sustain production. Iran has attempted to break the US blockade several times. The US Navy has intercepted at least two VLCCs this week in the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea, forcing these vessels and others to turn back to Iranian ports. Currently, there is a large gathering of tankers and other ships near the Iranian port of Chabahar, close to the border with Pakistan. This week, the US also boarded the "Majestic X" tanker carrying Iranian oil in the Indian Ocean, and in the days prior, intercepted the "Tifani" tanker between Sri Lanka and the Strait of Malacca. Both vessels have been sanctioned by the US, indicating that the blockade extends far beyond the Gulf of Oman. Since the outbreak of hostilities in the Middle East at the end of February and Iran's actual blockade of the Hormuz Strait to block passage for other vessels, Iran has become the sole major oil exporter in the Persian Gulf. The decline in exports will also impact Iran's main financial support - oil revenue. A team of analysts led by Natasha Kaneva from JPMorgan Chase pointed out in a report on April 21 that if tankers cannot sail, US actions may ultimately force Iran to reduce production. This move would "limit exports from a logistical rather than just a financial perspective, greatly reducing the space for sanctions evasion and ultimately forcing Iran to cut production." However, this process will not happen overnight. The energy consulting firm FGE NexantECA stated in a report that Iran currently has 90 million barrels of available storage space, meaning that even if US sanctions completely block exports, Iran can sustain production at the current daily production level of approximately 3.5 million barrels for two months. Miad Maleki, a former US Treasury official responsible for sanctions policy during Trump's first term and now a senior researcher at the policy research institution Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said, "They are loading tankers, which buys them more time. This also somewhat alleviates the imminent problem of running out of storage space." It is understood that most tankers transporting Iranian oil will turn off their automatic identification signals during navigation. Even before this conflict, most vessels related to Iran would stop sending signals when entering the Strait of Hormuz into the Persian Gulf. They typically only resume signals when entering the Strait of Malacca - about a 13-day journey from Kharg Island. Tankers attempting to bypass the US blockade are likely to employ similar tactics. Therefore, even if a vessel successfully evades the US Navy, it will take about a week or longer to appear in the vessel tracking system.