Production was suspended on Sunday night at Iraq’s Khor Mor gas field, one of the largest in the Kurdistan Region, after a drone attack struck the site and set a storage tank ablaze. The field supplies fuel to power stations that generate most of the region’s electricity, and the outage left large parts of Kurdistan without power overnight.
The attack came at about 11pm local time, according to a joint statement from the Kurdistan Regional Government’s natural resources and electricity ministries, which described it as a "terrorist attack". Two sources in the region’s electricity ministry told Reuters that a single drone strike hit the liquefied petroleum gas storage tank, starting a fire that was still burning hours later. An engineer at the field said smoke was seen rising from the site and all crew were ordered into shelters for fear of further attacks.
The region’s electricity ministry said about 2.8 gigawatts of generating capacity was lost — between 2,500 and 2,800 megawatts — and Al Jazeera reported that more than 70 per cent of the Kurdish region was left without power. The ministry said it would draw on the Dukan and Darbandikhan hydropower stations and other fuel-capable plants to keep hospitals and water stations running while gas supplies were cut.
Iraq’s prime minister, Ali al-Zaidi, said an initial assessment found no casualties, and early on Monday he ordered a joint investigation with the Kurdistan Region’s authorities into the attack. No group has claimed responsibility.
Khor Mor, in Chamchamal district in Sulaymaniyah province, produces about 750 million cubic feet of natural gas a day. It is operated by the UAE-based Dana Gas and Crescent Petroleum through the Pearl Petroleum consortium, and the operators say it fuels more than 80 per cent of the region’s electricity generation.
The field has been attacked repeatedly. A drone strike in November 2025 set a storage tank on fire and halted supplies to power plants, and an attack in April 2024 killed four foreign workers. Dana Gas shut the field’s main production facilities in July this year because of security threats and regional tensions, before restarting production later the same month.
Several details of Sunday’s attack remain unconfirmed. A security source told the Kurdish outlet Rudaw that the attack was launched from the disputed town of Tuz Khurmatu, but that claim has not been independently verified, and a reporter at the scene said sources could not confirm whether the projectile was a drone or a rocket. The full extent of the damage and when production will restart are also not yet known.
Sources: Reuters (https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/production-suspended-iraqs-khor-mor-gas-field-after-drone-attack-sources-say-2026-11-08/), AFP, Rudaw and Al Jazeera.
