No, this video does not show a drone attack on ships in Egypt

On July 29, the Energos Winter, a US-owned natural gas storage vessel, was struck by an unidentified drone at Damietta. The fire also spread to the GasLog Salem, a Greek-owned LNG tanker.

Damietta, on Egypt's Mediterranean coast, is one of Egypt's main liquefied natural gas (LNG) export hubs serving Europe.

Several videos show the aftermath of the attack, including thick smoke rising from the Damietta LNG terminal and firefighters spraying water onto the vessels. The fires were extinguished, and Egyptian authorities reported no casualties.

Another video circulated widely on Instagram, X and Telegram, attracting millions of views. It shows the moment a drone strikes the bridge of a ship. The sailor filming the footage can be heard speaking Arabic before running towards the bridge after the explosion.

In this X post, a video falsely described as showing a drone attack on a US vessel in Egypt has been viewed more than one million times. The video in fact shows a Ukrainian drone striking a Russian-owned ship in the Black Sea on July 24.

The footage predates the Damietta incident by five days. The vessel shown is the New Victory, a Russian bulk carrier struck by a Ukrainian drone in the Black Sea on July 24. Footage of that attack was widely shared by news outlets and social media users.

FRANCE 24 also independently confirmed that the video does not show either the Energos Winter or the GasLog Salem, the two vessels that caught fire in Egypt. A comparison of visible features with photographs published on specialist vessel-tracking websites found that the ship matched the Russian bulk carrier New Victory.

On July 30, Egypt's cabinet confirmed that a drone attack had caused the fire on the two vessels. No country or group has claimed responsibility.

The incident came amid an intensifying conflict involving Iran and Yemen's Houthis on one side, and the United States and Israel on the other. The war has severely disrupted fuel shipments through the Persian Gulf and Red Sea.

Since the US-Israeli coalition began its war against Iran on February 28, Iran has attempted to block the Strait of Hormuz, a strategically important waterway for global energy exports from the Persian Gulf. On July 20, the Houthis announced a maritime blockade targeting Saudi vessels in the Bab al-Mandab Strait, which connects the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean.

Some international media outlets, including The New York Times, reported claims of possible Iranian involvement in the July 29 drone attack. Iran's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, rejected the reports in a post on X and warned of what he described as Israeli "false-flag operations" intended to undermine regional peace.