Mike Baker

It's Tuesday, the 23rd of June.

Welcome to the PDB Afternoon Bulletin.

I'm Mike Baker, your eyes and ears on the world stage.

All right, let's get briefed.

First up, the good news, the Strait of Hormuz is no longer at a standstill.

The bad news, well, shipping companies still don't trust it.

We'll take a closer look at why traffic remains well below pre-war levels despite signs of recovery.

Later in the show, a bizarre new detail emerges from the war with Iran.

A U.S.

fighter pilot shot down over Iranian territory reportedly described seeing a swarm of drones moving through the sky in what he called a jellyfish formation moments before his aircraft was hit.

But first, today's afternoon spotlight.

There's both good news and bad news coming out of the Strait of Hormuz this week.

The good news is that traffic is moving again.

Following last week's memorandum of understanding between the U.S.

and Iran, commercial vessels have begun returning to the waterway.

Iranian oil exports are resuming as the U.S.

lifts its blockade of Iranian ports and eases sanctions on the regime.

And some of the massive backlog of ships trapped inside the Persian Gulf is finally starting to clear.

Now, the bad news is that the Strait of Hormuz is still a long way from normal.

According to maritime tracking firm Kepler, 109 vessels transited the strait between Saturday and Monday.