Turkey’s Cagri Bey drilling vessel arrives in Somalia for first offshore oil drilling

Türkiye’s deep-sea drilling vessel Çağrı Bey has reached Mogadishu, setting the stage for Somalia’s first offshore oil drilling campaign, officials from both countries said Friday.

Energy and Natural Resources Minister Alparslan Bayraktar described the mission as “historic,” saying it would “open a new chapter in Turkish energy history.”

The work stems from a hydrocarbon agreement signed in 2024, which gave Türkiye’s state-owned energy company TPAO the right to explore three offshore blocks, each covering about 5,000 square kilometers (1,900 square miles).

Before the drilling ship arrived, another Turkish vessel conducted seismic surveys in late 2024 across the same three blocks to pinpoint potential drilling locations.

With a red bow marked by a white star and crescent and a drilling derrick mounted on top, the Çağrı Bey entered Somali waters Thursday and berthed at the capital’s port on Friday.

“It docked this (Friday) morning… the ship is very big, we have never seen anything like this at the port before,” Abshir Yare, a port employee, told Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Somalia’s state news agency SONNA said Thursday that the vessel will carry out “Somalia’s first-ever offshore drilling operations.”

Bayraktar also said on X that the ship will undertake Türkiye’s “first overseas deep-sea drilling” outside its own territorial waters.

“We believe that this cooperation between Türkiye and Somalia, based on mutual trust, brotherhood, and a common understanding of development, will open the door to a new and powerful era in the relations between the two countries,” he wrote.

Bayraktar joined Somali President Hassan Sheikh, PM Hamza Abdi Barre, and ministers at a ceremony in Mogadishu port on Friday alongside Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud.

Türkiye has become one of Somalia’s most important military and economic partners, and Ankara opened its largest overseas base in Mogadishu in 2017.

The drilling program is expected to run for nearly 10 months.

The Çağrı Bey will start work at a well roughly 372 kilometers off Somalia’s coast. Named “Curad,” a Somali word for the first-born child in a family, the well is expected to rank among the deepest offshore wells in the world.