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After four days of standstill, operations began, which are expected to be complex, to free the Canal from the container ship Ever Given. The Suez Canal Authority has announced the end of dredging operations (excavation of the seabed) and the start of towing maneuvers for the container ship that has been blocking the important maritime connection between Asia and Europe since Tuesday. However, it is a complex procedure that involves several attempts, which could also fail.
“The head of the authority, Admiral Osama Rabie, announced the start of the towing maneuvers of the stranded ship through nine giant tugs led by Baraka 1 and Ezzat Adel,” reports a post published last night on the Facebook page of the Authority.
Charging…
This, it is added, “after the completion of the dredging operations on the bow of the ship carried out by the Mashour dredge. Admiral Rabie explained that towing maneuvers require the availability of several auxiliary factors, the most important of which are wind direction, high and low tides: a complex technical process that has its own estimates, procedures and multiple attempts ”, adds the text .
Ever Given, 400 meters long and almost 60 meters wide, ran aground in the Suez Canal in the middle of a sandstorm, going sideways and completely obstructing it, forcing companies to divert their ships. The blockade has also created a jam of more than 200 boats stopped in the Red Sea, according to data from the Lloyd’s List newspaper. Losses are estimated at $ 9.6 billion per day. Yukito Higaki, president of the Shoei Kisen Kaisha company, said yesterday that “the ship is not taking water” and “once it is clear, it will be able to navigate.”
The United States, concerned about the impact of the blockade of the Suez Canal on markets, offered help to Egypt to “reopen the canal.” Turkey also took a step forward, aiming to relaunch relations with Egypt after strong tensions following the 2013 dismissal of Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, an expression of the Muslim Brotherhood.
