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The Documentary Podcast

What is the 'Shadow Fleet'?

The Documentary Podcast

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.32.6K Ratings

🗓️ 29 November 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Around one fifth of the world's oil tankers now belong to the 'shadow fleet', more than a thousand ships which Russia uses to skirt sanctions and - increasingly - conduct acts of sabotage and hybrid warfare. BBC Russian's economics reporter Alexey Kalmykov explains how, with its opaque ownership structures and uninsured, poorly maintained ships, the shadow fleet presents an ecological, economic and strategic threat.

On the night of 13th November 1985, the Nevado del Ruiz volcano in Colombia erupted, and the resulting landslide of mud and debris devastated the nearby city of Armero, causing twenty thousand deaths in the city itself and a further 5,000 in the wider area. In the aftermath, a baby called Jennifer was left with the Red Cross by her mother, who is then believed to have ventured back to the ruins of the family home to search for her partner. She never returned. BBC Mundo's Jose Carlos Cueto tells the story of Jennifer, who has become known as the 'daughter of the volcano' and continues to search for the truth about her mother.

Chicken 65 is a spicy, crispy chicken dish adored in the south of India. You can eat it in upmarket restaurants and roadside food stalls alike. But how did it get its name? From the BBC's Delhi Bureau, Bimal Thankachan joins Faranak as they eat some Chicken 65 and dive into the story of how it got its name.

This episode of The Documentary comes to you from The Fifth Floor, the show at the heart of global storytelling, with BBC journalists from all around the world.

Presented by Faranak Amidi.

Produced by Laura Thomas, Caroline Ferguson and Hannah Dean.

This is an EcoAudio certified production.

(Photo: Faranak Amidi. Credit: Tricia Yourkevich.)

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts.

0:06.0

Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service.

0:13.8

You're listening The Fifth Floor.

0:17.6

The Fifth Floor, you know you, listen.

0:20.1

Weism like.

0:23.2

To me, he's the fifth floor Farnak Amidi, Sobath.

0:26.7

This is the fifth floor

0:28.5

at the heart of global

0:30.4

storytelling

0:31.2

with BBC journalists

0:32.9

from all around the world.

0:35.0

I'm your host, Faranak Amidi.

0:42.1

Thank you. from all around the world. I'm your host, Faranak Amidi. Hello and welcome to the program.

0:44.2

I'm in the fifth floor studio with Alexi Kalmikov,

0:48.2

the economic reporter for BBC Russian,

0:50.8

and we're going to talk about oil tankers.

0:53.8

Alexi, I was thinking, if I wanted to buy an oil tanker, could I just go about doing that?

1:00.9

Sure.

1:01.4

If you have a spare $40 million, around that, $40 million, he can go and shop for one.

1:08.7

They're in high demand and they're in high demand because the shadow fleet

1:12.7

is growing. Why do we call them shadow fleet? Because they operate in the shadow. So basically

1:18.7

oil trade now consists of the legitimate, say white fleet and some kind of a piracy style

...

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