October 6, 2002: Al-Qaeda Attacks Oil Tanker

The Limburg after the attack. [Source: NAVSEA]Al-Qaeda conducts a suicide bombing against a French oil tanker, the Limburg. The attack takes places in the Gulf of Aden off the coast of Yemen. One crew member is killed and over 90,000 barrels of oil leak into the sea. The attack is similar to the one on the USS Cole almost two years before (see October 12, 2000) and is planned by one of the same people, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. [BBC, 10/16/2002; 9/11 Commission, 7/24/2004, pp. 153]