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Oil storage tanks at the Phillips 66 Bayway Refinery in Linden, N.J. (Bing Guan/Bloomberg Finance)

The Iran conflict has caused major disruptions to global supply chains that experts warn could ripple down to domestic trucking.

The U.S. and Israel launched attacks against the country leading to a military escalation across the region, disrupting major international trade corridors and the movement of critical shipments including those tied to the energy and petrochemical industries.

“Because of the Strait of Hormuz, the way the geography is in that part of the region, it’s very easy to control or constrain shipping,” said Pawan Joshi, chief strategy officer at E2open. “That’s really what has happened during the hostilities in that area.”

Joshi has seen ships that weren’t yet stuck in the strait begin to reroute. He noted that shipments traversing the region are primarily petrochemical-based products such as fertilizer ingredients, with the dominant effect being higher fuel costs globally.

“Given the hostilities in that area, a lot of the commercial airlines are actually avoiding that space, and they’re taking longer routes,” Joshi said. “Also, a lot of the airports in that region are not operating at capacity, so it’s not only the longer flights but also the overall air capacity.”

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Joshi expects the decline in air capacity to show up as freight costs and a drop in cargo coming out of the region. But he also noted that the domino effect of the global disruptions could surface across other parts of the world, including the cost of trucking across North America.

“In terms of capacity, we’re probably not seeing a massive impact because our trucks and our regional lanes of transportation over the land tend to be unaffected,” Joshi said. “What does get affected is the price for securing the same capacity, because the fuel price is going up.”

Joshi also noted that demand has been fairly stable given the products that flow from the region and available inventories, but he cautioned that demand could slow if the situation continues.

“The biggest thing, obviously …is oil prices,” said Tony Pelli, director of supply chain security and resilience at BSI Consulting. He also noted the fuel price spike is pressuring air cargo rates because of the Middle East being a major hub, with Dubai in particular serving as an east-west transit lane.

Pelli, too, is concerned about the downstream impacts if the Strait of Hormuz remains blocked. He warned that the disruptions to petroleum-based products, production feedstock and energy-intensive manufacturing could further destabilize global supply chains.

“As far as the U.S. trucking industry, I think, the biggest impact will just be oil prices,” Pelli said. “That’ll increase the price of trucking, and you may see frustration from individual trucking companies, carriers, that kind of thing, around the cost of gas and diesel.”

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TD Cowen suspects that shippers are likely to bear the brunt of these market disruptions due to surcharges, fees and delays. But the investment bank and financial services company also views less-than-truckload carriers as better positioned, since fuel surcharges can become revenue generator for that mode during periods of diesel price volatility.

“Things are developing pretty quickly, especially just a week ago,” Dirk Stammnitz, a consultant at business consulting firm Catalant, said of the Strait of Hormuz. “That certainly has had some serious, some substantial, impacts on the flows of ships in and out of the region.”

Stammnitz has seen companies respond by shifting to larger container fleets or by rerouting, though alternative routes can add weeks and possibly surcharges to a shipment. He even has seen some insurance companies pull coverage from the region.

While oil remains the main focus, Stammnitz noted petrochemicals, plastics and other industries are also affected from a raw materials standpoint.

Regional shipments impacted are not all moving through Iran, according to Stammnitz. The greater conflict has involved missile strikes into neighboring countries that produce and transport shipments such as rare earth minerals that are critical for technology and batteries. He also anticipates that the resulting global disruptions could impact U.S. trucking.

“Since it leads with the fuel story, as I said, and energy markets first, it’s initially less about the physical flows,” Stammnitz said. “If we start to get into one month, two months, and beyond, now it starts to impact shippers — and they’re going to start delaying orders, of course, because they don’t want to pay the increases.”