Trump warns Iran’s oil infrastructure may ‘explode’ in three days

President Trump suggests US blockade on Iran could cause the Islamic Republic’s oil infrastructure to explode imminently.

By David Rosenberg, World Israel News

Iran’s oil infrastructure could “explode” sometime in the next three days as a result of the American blockade on the Islamic Republic, President Donald Trump warned over the weekend.

Speaking with Fox News on Sunday, the president said that without the ability to export oil, Iran’s storage infrastructure will be overwhelmed within a matter of days, culminating in explosions.

“When you have, you know, lines of vast amounts of oil pouring through your system, if for any reason that line is closed because you can’t continue to put it into containers or ships, which has happened to them — they have no ships because of the blockade — what happens is that line explodes from within, both mechanically and in the earth,” Trump told Fox News.

The damage to Iran’s oil infrastructure could be permanent, the president added.

“It’s something that happens where it just explodes. And they say they only have about three days left before that happens. And when it explodes, you can never, regardless, you can never rebuild it the way it was.”

According to a report by the New York Post, some experts have said that Iran’s oil infrastructure could be in danger in the immediate future, suggesting that Iran may be forced to shut down production at its oil fields as early as April 29 to prevent its storage facilities from being overloaded.

Iran has reportedly already exhausted its primary storage capacity off the mainland, and is diverting excess oil to secondary tanks located onshore.

Shutting down oil field production could cause “long-term damage” to the fields, said Annika Ganzeveld, the Middle East portfolio manager for the American Enterprise Institute, in an interview with the Post.

The regime could extend its storage capacity by using oil tankers as makeshift oil reservoirs.

However, without an outlet for oil exports, Iran’s storage capacity, estimated at 122 million barrels, will eventually run out, regardless of stopgap solutions.

At that point, the regime will be forced to halt all oil production, a step that would inflict lasting economic damage.