A merchant ship caught fire and sank off the coast of Romania in the Black Sea on Thursday evening, likely after being hit, Romanian Presi
The Romanian Border Police on Friday confirmed the fire on board a commercial ship sailing through Romania’s exclusive economic zone, but did not provide a cause.
Black Sea shipping and port facilities have been targeted repeatedly since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, with the pace of attacks escalating in 2026.
“The ship was hit… it seems to have sunk,” Dan told journalists during a news conference in Chisinau, Moldova, on Thursday, adding that at present no information was available as to who might have been involved in a possible strike.
“There will be an investigation, it will be established, but it is not good for us to start speculating,” the president said. The event had taken place outside Romania’s territorial waters, he said.
All 12 people on board the merchant ship had been rescued, the Romanian Border Police said in a statement.
“Of these, 10 people were rescued by the border guards, one of them being injured, and two others were rescued by the crew of the merchant ship,” they said.
2025 included the first ever federal nuclear verdict against a marijuana company, another from an antitrust case from basketball great Michael Jordan against NASCAR, and a $40 million RICO award against an internet troll posing as a government spy, Marathon observed.
Overall, 68 industries were affected by a nuclear verdict in 2026 compared with 55 in 2024 and 48 in 2023. Among the most familiar with nuclear verdicts are beverage companies, pharmaceuticals, auto manufacturers, hotels
and restaurants, agricultural chemical manufacturers, banks, and oil and gas. Insurance had five nuclear verdicts for a sum of $390 million.
Product liability cases resulted in 29 nuclear verdicts totaling $12 billion in 2025. Trade-secret disputes, intellectual-property cases, and workplace negligence also had a large share of nuclear cases. New possible areas of risk are
emerging such as PFAS, AI liability, deepfakes, and climate attribution, among others.
Marathon said eight states in 2025 enacted tort reform laws, including establishing caps and increasing disclosure for third-party litigation funders. Those eight
states were Arkansas, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, Oklahoma, and South Carolina. Texas, California, Florida, and Maryland ranked highest for nuclear verdicts.
Florida’s tort reform in 2023 did result in a drop-off in 2024, to 10th in nuclear verdicts. However, the Sunshine State returned to nuclear-verdict prominence in 2025 with a total of $2.5 billion in nuclear verdicts.