Tuesday 6 October 2020 · below the Index · spike
Port Sudan terminal blocked; Iranian tanker docks Venezuela
Multiple maritime events during this window: Port Sudan's container terminal was blocked by protesters over a peace deal dispute (Oct 4); a third Iranian tanker docked at a Venezuelan port amid fuel supply discussions (Oct 5); a container vessel fuel leak was contained at a New Jersey terminal (Oct 4); and a container ship ran aground in South America (Oct 4). The spike reflects mixed attention across freight markets, seafarer issues, and trade disruptions rather than a single dominant incident.
Peak 49.3 on Monday 5 October 2020. The shaded band is the incident window.
Where the attention came from
Mixed-led, both over the window and on the peak day. Social here is X alone — Bluesky only joins the series from July 2024 — so its level isn't directly comparable with today's series, though its share of this incident is real.
Bar = share of the extra attention over the whole window; the tick marks the share on the peak day alone, where the two differ.
How unusual it was
This was above 21% of all days since 2020, and the highest since Monday 5 October 2020.
How far it spread
No vessel type moved — 0 of 6 vessel-type groups drew clearly more readers than usual.
Bars start at 1× — normal readership for that vessel type, the weeks before the incident. Grey = no clear lift. "Over time" shows each group's daily readers through the window; "All 12 articles" breaks the six groups back into their members.
How it was framed the frame glossary →
Lead frame: geopolitical pawn. Trade press was 0% of in-scope coverage — the story had left the trade press and gone mainstream. (Historical coverage is scored on headlines only.)
Acting, or acted upon
In 61% of coverage shipping was the thing acted upon rather than the actor; 0% of it was strongly negative in tone.
What the coverage said
- Third Iranian tanker docks at Venezuelan port; Maduro promises fuel supplyreuters.com · 2020-10-05
- Third Iranian Tanker Docks At Venezuelan Portmarinelink.com · 2020-10-05
- Port Sudan container terminal blocked in peace deal protest-National Posteasternontarionetwork.com · 2020-10-04
- Port Sudan container terminal blocked in peace deal...thisismoney.co.uk · 2020-10-04
- Port Sudan container terminal, major road blocked in peace deal protestalarabiya.net · 2020-10-04
- Protesters Block Port Sudan Container Terminal In Rejection of Peace Dealaawsat.com · 2020-10-05
Gold rule = a national or international outlet, not a trade title.
- social = X only before Bluesky (2024-07-01); not comparable with today's series
- tier C: only a Wikipedia article, GDELT sub-vocabulary term, or social per-term query fired — not yet confirmed as a real maritime incident (Phase C naming/is_maritime_incident does that).
- naming step found more than one plausible cause in the headlines (alternatives: ['Port Sudan container terminal blocked by protesters', 'Iranian tanker docks at Venezuelan port', 'Container vessel fuel leak at New Jersey terminal', 'Container ship aground in South America']) — attribution.confidence is low; label may be an honest compound
- coverage scored on title only (no excerpt) — measured ~8pp frame precision cost vs title+excerpt (docs/HANDOVER-incidents.md §2.3)
- coverage filtered to articles matching this incident specifically (33/238 kept) — see coverage.filter.terms
Maritime Attention Index, incident: Port Sudan terminal blocked; Iranian tanker docks Venezuela, peak 49.3 on 5 October 2020. maritimeattentionindex.com/incidents/2020-port-sudan-terminal-blocked-iranian-tanker-docks-venezuela/