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This is the world’s longest maritime traffic jam! Today, Saturday, March 27, 2021, a giant container ship, Ever Given of Evergreen (a Taiwanese transporting company),  remained stuck sideways, when it’s on the way from China to Netherlands,  in Egypt’s Suez Canal for the fifth day. The authorities tried to make new attempts to free the vessel and reopen a crucial east-west waterway for global shipping. A fresh attempt to refloat the vessel was not successful today. About 30% of the world’s shipping container volume transits through the Suez Canal daily and about 12% of the world’s trade volume makes its way through Suez Canal. More than two hundred ships are caught in this maritime traffic jam, waiting to enter the waterway. Some of them are rerouting their journey around the Cape of Good Hope, a trip that would take three times as long as through the Suez Canal. USA is among the growing list of countries offering help to refloat the Ever Given.  In the video below, published on March 27, 2021, maritime expert Dr. Sal Mercogliano spoke about how the ship became lodged and what makes freeing it so complicated, in “Suez Canal: Why is freeing the blocked ship so complicated? DW News“, below:

Mv Ever Given is blocking the Suez canal – why can’t they just pull it out or dig it out? Why will this last a long time, in the video published by TheGeotechengineer, published on March 26, 2021, “MV Ever Given – why can’t it be pulled out?” below:

Egypt’s Suez Canal Authority (SCA) announced on Thursday, March 25, 2021, that it was temporarily suspending navigation through one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes until the grounded container ship MC Ever Given is refloated. This announcement came after low tide overnight slowed efforts to dislodge the massive container ship that has choked traffic in both direction along the canal and created one of the worst shipping jams seen in years, in the video published on March 25, 2021, “Suez Canal suspends traffic as tug boats work to free ship“, below: 

Rescuers are racing to dislodge a vast container ship stuck in the Suez Canal before tides shift next week, potentially straining there for weeks. This is costing the global economy tens of billions of dollars, in the video published on March 26, 2021 “A Giant, Stranded Cargo Ship Is Blocking All Traffic Through the Suez Canal“, below:

Many questions remain regarding the cause of this situation: mechanical failure? operator error? maintenance failure? crew fatigue?

A mobile crane on ship or at the canal seem to be the reasonable equipment to have to reduce the weight of the ship before the position of the ship may be changed. Perhaps a mobile crane on ship needs to be recommended in the future. 

Experts are warning that it could take weeks to dislodge this huge container ship blocking Egypt’s Suez Canal. The only alternate route, around the Horn of Africa, is much longer, But many ships are now opting for the detour. The prolonged closure of the Suez will certainly impact global trade, which had already been impacted by the pandemic. The 400 meter long and 200,000 ton “Ever Given” is the ship plugging the chokepoint that funnels 30% of the global seaborne trade. It has become the immovable barrier shutting down Egypt’s Suez Canal. Diggers, tugboats, dredgers, and a team of Dutch ship salvagers are working day and night to dislodge Ever Given.

In the video published on March 25, 2021, “Suez Canal shutdown impacts billions of dollars in trade“, below:

CNBC’s Jon Fortt discusses the blockage of major shipping waterway the Suez Canal in Egypt and its impact on global supply chain with Brian Course of SEKO Logistics, in the video published on March 26, 2021, “Behind the supply chain implications of the Suez Canal blockage“, below:

To better understand the incident of 2021 obstruction by Ever Given, please refer to the excerpt from wikipedia, in italics, below:

On 23 March 2021, at around 05:40 UTC (07:40 local time),^[96] the Suez Canal was blocked in both directions by the ultra-large Golden-class container ship Ever Given.^[97] The ship, operated by Evergreen Marine, was en route from Malaysia to the Netherlands when she ran aground after a strong gust of wind blew her off course.^[96] Upon running aground, Ever Given turned sideways, completely blocking the canal.^[98][96] Although part of the length of the canal is paralleled by an older narrower channel which can still be used to bypass obstructions, this particular incident happened in a section of the canal with only one channel.^[99]

At the dawn of the incident, many economists and trade experts have commented on the effects of the obstruction if not resolved quickly, citing how important the Suez is to global trade, and the incident is likely to drastically affect the global economy because of the trapped goods scheduled to go through the canal following the incident. Among the products, oil shipments are the most affected in the immediate aftermath, due to a significant amount of them remaining blocked with no way to reach their destination.^[100][101] Referring to the European and American market, a few maritime experts have disputed the prediction of a drastic effect on trade, saying this “really isn’t a substantial transit route for crude” according to Marshall Steeves, energy markets analyst at IHS Markit, and “there are existing stocks” according to Camille Egloff of Boston Consulting Group and alternative sources of supply, noting that traffic has only slowed down and that this might only impact sectors with existing shortages such as the semiconductor industry.^[102][103] International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) estimates that up to $3 billion worth of cargo passes through the Suez Canal every day.^[104]

It is said the blockage is going to have an impact on cargo schedules around the world. Shipping companies are also considering whether to divert their ships along the much longer route around Cape Agulhas. The first container ship to do so is Ever Given’s sister ship, Ever Greet.^[105]

In the video published on March 26, 2021, “How will the Suez Canal blockage disrupt global trade? Inside Story“, below:

For background information regarding the Suez Canal, please refer to the excerpt from wikipedia, in italics, below:

The Suez Canal is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia. Constructed between 1859 and 1869 by the Suez Canal Company formed by Ferdinand de Lesseps in 1858, it officially opened on 17 November 1869. The canal offers watercraft a more direct route between the North Atlantic and northern Indian oceans via the Mediterranean and Red seas, thus avoiding the South Atlantic and southern Indian oceans and reducing the journey distance from the Arabian Sea to Asia by approximately 8,900 kilometres (5,500 mi), or 8-10 days.^[1] It extends from the northern terminus of Port Said to the southern terminus of Port Tewfik at the city of Suez. Its length is 193.30 km (120.11 mi) including its northern and southern access-channels. In 2020, over 18,500 vessels traversed the canal (an average of 51.5 per day).^[2]

The original canal featured a single-lane waterway with passing locations in the Ballah Bypass and the Great Bitter Lake.^[3] It contained, according to Alois Negrelli‘s plans, no lock systems, with seawater flowing freely through it. In general, the water in the canal north of the Bitter Lakes flows north in winter and south in summer. South of the lakes, the current changes with the tide at Suez.^[4]

While the canal as such was the property of the Egyptian government, European shareholders, mostly French and British, owned the concessionary company which operated it until July 1956, when President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized it—an event which led to the Suez Crisis of October–November 1956.^[5] The canal is operated and maintained by the state-owned Suez Canal Authority^[6] (SCA) of Egypt. Under the Convention of Constantinople, it may be used “in time of war as in time of peace, by every vessel of commerce or of war, without distinction of flag.”^[7] Nevertheless, the canal has played an important military strategic role as a naval short-cut and choke-point. Navies with coastlines and bases on both the Mediterranean and Red Seas (Egypt and Israel) have a particular interest in the Suez Canal. After Egypt closed the Suez canal at the beginning of the Six Day War on June 5, 1967, the canal remained closed for precisely eight years, reopening on June 5, 1975.^[8]

In August 2014, the Egyptian government launched construction to expand and widen the Ballah Bypass for 35 km (22 mi) to speed up the canal’s transit-time. The expansion intended to nearly double the capacity of the Suez Canal, from 49 to 97 ships per day.^[9] At a cost of 59.4 billion Egyptian pounds (US$9bn), this project was funded with interest-bearing investment certificates issued exclusively to Egyptian entities and individuals. The “New Suez Canal“, as the expansion was dubbed, was opened in a ceremony on 6 August 2015.^[10]

On 24 February 2016, the Suez Canal Authority officially opened the new side channel. This side channel, located at the northern side of the east extension of the Suez Canal, serves the East Terminal for berthing and unberthing vessels from the terminal. As the East Container Terminal is located on the Canal itself, before the construction of the new side channel it was not possible to berth or unberth vessels at the terminal while a convoy was running.^[11]

Many questions remain regarding the cause of this situation: mechanical failure? operator error? maintenance failure? crew fatigue?

Perhaps a mobile crane on ship or at the canal seem to be the reasonable equipment to have to reduce the weight of the ship before the position of the ship may be changed. Perhaps a mobile crane on ship needs to be recommended in the future. 

Gathered, written, and posted by Windermere Sun-Susan Sun Nunamaker More about the community at www.WindermereSun.com

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