Why One Tiny Strait Controls the Price of Your Gas

One narrow strait between Iran and Oman decides what you pay at the pump. Here's how the 2026 Iran war turned the Strait of Hormuz into the most important 21 miles of water on Earth — and why the Red Sea's own "door," Bab al-Mandab, matters just as much. CHAPTERS 00:00 Cold open 00:33 The 21-mile door 01:29 February 28 02:26 Why your gas price moves 03:31 The back door 04:37 The second door 05:28 What happens next SOURCES 2026 Iran war (overview & timeline) — Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Ir... Economic impact of the 2026 Iran war — Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economi... 2026 Iran war fuel crisis — Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Ir... ABC News — Gas prices unlikely to fall below $4 before midterms (Oct 22, 2026): https://abcnews.com/Business/gas-pric... ABC News — Record number of days above $4 a gallon: https://abcnews.com/Business/gas-pric... Al Jazeera — Is Iran charging a toll to allow oil traffic through Hormuz? (Oct 5, 2026): https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/1... FDD Long War Journal — Houthis take Yemen's Red Sea coast and key Bab al-Mandeb islands (Sep 14, 2026): https://www.longwarjournal.org/archiv... CREDITS Terrain imagery: Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (CC BY 4.0), contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data Archive footage: U.S. Central Command / U.S. Navy (public domain), shown as illustration Photo of Ali Khamenei: khamenei.ir (CC BY 4.0) Photo of Abdul-Malik al-Houthi: Wikishia (CC BY 2.0) Narration: AI voice. Some scenes are AI illustrations (labelled on screen). Watch next: Why the Houthis Are at War With Saudi Arabia #Hormuz #Iran #OilPrices #GasPrices #Explained #HeyHowCome