Ship traffic was briefly suspended on the Bosphorus late on Sunday after a tanker suffered a rudder failure in the middle of the tricky waterway.
Local coast guards urgently send two tug boats to assist and tow away the 4,600-dwt Nazan (built 2006), a vessel managed by Turkey-based Burtrans Denizcilik.
The ship had suffered the malfunction at Kandilli, where the Bosphorus is at its narrowest and takes a sharp turn.
Ship engine failure and other accidents often occur during Turkish Straits crossings.
The country’s authorities usually respond quickly, dispatching tugs to remove the stricken vessels and tow them to a safe location.
Turkish coastguards announced the temporary closure of the Bosphorus due to the Nazan incident on 18:42 GMT. Traffic was reinstated about four hours later.
The Nazan, currently at anchor at the Istanbul anchorage south of the city in the Sea of Marmara, is laden with a cargo from Russia. It was heading to a Turkish port in the nearby Kocaeli province.
The Bosphorus closed for more than eight hours in January after an aframax tanker put on a US blacklist for violating the Western price cap scheme on seaborne Russian oil got stuck in the waterway.
Ships involved in Russian trades have often been involved in such incidents, raising local concerns about their safety after the US and its allies imposed restrictions on their finance and insurance.
