AL-MUKALLA: The UK Maritime Trade Operations organization said it received reports of a missile hitting a ship southeast of Yemen’s southern city of Aden, shortly after residents in the central province of Al-Bayda and neighboring Abyan province reported seeing a missile fired from a Houthi-controlled area.
UKMTO “has received a report of an incident 95NM South East of Aden, Yemen. Master reports port side of vessel hit from above by a missile,” the agency said. The warning came roughly an hour after locals in Abyan’s Lawdar district — which is close to the missile’s supposed launch site — reported seeing a missile launched from Houthi-controlled territory in Al-Bayda’s Mukayras fly over their neighborhoods.
“The missile was launched at around 3:55 p.m. from a hilly position held by the Houthis in Mukayras, and residents heard an explosion and observed missile smoke in the sky,” Mohsen Al-Markhi, a journalist from Lawder, told Arab News by telephone. Another missile launched by the Houthis exploded near a village in the southern province of Al-Dhale on Monday, only hours after the US shot down a Houthi missile aimed at a US Navy ship in the Red Sea.
Residents in the Jahaf district reported a massive explosion on Monday after a ballistic missile fell in a hilly part of the district. Locals sent Arab News a video of a large ball of dust and smoke rising from the site after the missile blasts.
Residents say the missile was not targeting their neighborhoods and landed before it reached its intended target. Yemen’s Defense Ministry news site reported that the ballistic missile was fired from the Houthi-controlled Al-Jaefri village in Al-Dhale and detonated in an area between two minor villages in Jahaf. Since the start of the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea in November, residents across Yemen, primarily those living in or near Houthi-controlled territory, have reported seeing Houthi missiles and drones flying over their areas, while others exploded near their farms after failing to reach their targets.
This comes as the US Central Command said that an anti-ship missile launched by the Houthis was shot down by a US fighter aircraft near Yemen’s coastal city of Hodeidah before reaching its target, the USS Laboon naval destroyer.
Courtesy: arabnews
