Saudi Arabia-led coalition forces have destroyed what they said were more boats packed with explosives by Houthi rebels in Yemen.
The operation occurred four nautical miles (7.4 km) off Ras as Salif port, Yemen, on the evening of 6 March.
The coalition said it blew up six "remote-controlled explosive boats" and "naval mine assembly, rigging and launch sites" in the southern Red Sea.
This was part of an operation against the Houthis' maritime arsenal in Hodeidah province, Saudi Arabian state news agency SPA reported.
Coalition spokesman Colonel Turki Al-Maliki said the destroyed targets could have been used against shipping lines in the Red Sea’s Bab-el-Mandeb strait.
The operation came within days of an attack on the 107,000-dwt Saudi Arabia-flagged aframax tanker Gladiolus (built 1998) in the Gulf of Aden.
Saudi Arabia has blamed the incident on the Houthis, which reportedly involved manned and unmanned skiffs.
Last month, the US Maritime Administration issued an alert warning of sea mines in territorial waters between Midi, Yemen, and Jazan, Saudi Arabia.
It also referenced the threat of unmanned surface vessels and waterborne improvised explosive devices in the region.
Evasive moves
Another tanker and an LNG carrier were forced to avoid a cluster of suspicious skiffs in that incident.
The boats came within 130 metres of Gladiolus on Tuesday morning.
The incident took place 172 km south of Nishtun in the maritime security transit corridor (MSTC).
The tanker was heading to the Gulf of Aden.
The aim was to trigger an explosion by using one of the unmanned skiffs, controlled from a distance, the coalition said.
Last month, coalition forces destroyed an explosive-laden boat planted by the Houthis in the Red Sea. The vessel was tracked and blown up.
It was reportedly launched from Hodeidah.
