Off-Nadir Delta

Houthis claim missile attack on merchant vessels in Bulgarian Black Sea waters

Titles and summaries are AI-extracted from news reporting; every source is linked below. Event id 2021c81a-af30-4ef1-849d-7540e06c2c28.

Where
Varnaresolved to locality43.207, 27.917
When
Occurrence date not stated by reportingFirst reported 2026-10-06 · last update 2026-10-17
Sourcing
136 reports136 reports across 81 outlets · independence not established
How far this got
localizednamed facility unresolvedRadar coverage

Summary

On October 6, two merchant vessels were attacked by drones in Bulgaria's exclusive economic zone in the Black Sea. One vessel, the Alfa Watan, sank with 10 crew members aboard, including nine Syrians and one Egyptian; search operations were called off. The other vessel, the Able, sustained damage and fire but was rescued. Bulgarian officials and Syria called for investigations, with Bulgaria publicly blaming Russia for the attacks. Russia and the Russian Embassy in Sofia denied responsibility, as did Ukraine. Captain Todor Georgiev also denied the incident occurred. Defence Minister Dimitar Stoyanov stated the strike was from an underwater drone. Bulgarian search teams found no drone debris aboard the Able. The Alfa Watan lies at an estimated depth of around 2,000 meters. Casualty figures differ: one report states two deaths and 11 rescued from a third vessel, the Royad Mammadov, while another indicates 18 crew members were rescued from the Able. Syria has challenged Bulgaria's decision to end rescue efforts and called for an independent investigation involving the International Maritime Organization.

What imagery could confirm

Which satellite to use, what to look for and why. Part of the event detail on Pro.

What remains unresolved

  • named facility unresolved

Timeline

56 recorded change(s). The ledger starts when this event was first folded: the initial observation is not recorded as a change, so an empty timeline means nothing has moved since, not that nothing is known.

    1 more change(s) — the values are part of the event detail on paid plans. 55 change(s) before the history shown here.

    Sources

    Grouped by outlet. Syndication is not collapsed, so several outlets can carry one wire story — the count is breadth of carriage, not independent confirmation.

    136 reports in all; the full list with the facts taken from each is part of the event detail on Pro.

    Related events

    84 related event(s) and 4 place(s) or facilities — the same facility, place, actor or campaign. Part of the event detail on Pro.

    Open the WatchfloorAsk Delta Agent

    Reproduce over the API (free endpoint)

    bash
    curl "https://offnadir-delta.com/api/v1/events/2021c81a-af30-4ef1-849d-7540e06c2c28/thread" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer ond_YOUR_API_KEY"

    For situational awareness only — not for tracking or targeting individuals. Every claim above links to its reporting; satellite fields are the same values the API serves.