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SINGAPORE: Efforts to dislodge a 400-meter-long container ship that has choked traffic along the Suez Canal resumed at high tide on Thursday (March 25), with five tugboats working to pull the vessel into waters. deeper, based on vessel tracking data.
The Ever Given vessel ran aground on the diagonal on the single-lane stretch of the South Canal Tuesday morning after losing the ability to drive amid high winds and a dust storm, the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) said. it’s a statement.
It is now blocking traffic in both directions through one of the world’s busiest shipping channels for goods, oil, grains and other products that link Asia and Europe.
Peter Berdowski, chief executive of Dutch company Boskalis, which is trying to free the ship, said it was too early to say how long the work would take.
“We cannot exclude that it could take weeks, depending on the situation,” Berdowski told the Dutch television program Nieuwsuur.
He said the bow and stern of the ship had been raised on both sides of the canal.
“It’s like a huge beached whale. It’s a huge weight in the sand. We may have to work with a combination of weight reduction by removing containers, oil and water from the ship, tugboats and sand dredging.
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Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement (BSM), Ever Given’s technical manager, said the dredgers were working to clear the sand and mud around the ship to free it, while the tugs along with Ever Given winches are working to change it.
Maritime services firm GAC issued a note to clients overnight saying that efforts to free the ship using tugs continued, but that wind conditions and the size of the ship “were hampering the operation.”
The ship tracking software shows five tugs circling Ever Given and three more heading towards it. However, the ship’s GPS signal shows only minor changes in its position during the last 24 hours.
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A closer view of the container ship Ever Given seen blocking the Suez Canal in this Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite image from the European Space Agency. (Photo: Reuters)
Several dozen ships, including other large container ships, oil and gas tankers, and grain-carrying bulk ships, have receded at both ends of the canal to create one of the worst shipping jams seen in years.
About 30 percent of the world’s shipping container volume transits the 193 km Suez Canal daily, and about 12 percent of total world trade in all goods.
Shipping experts say that if the blockade is not likely to clear within the next 24 to 48 hours, some shipping companies may be forced to redirect ships around the southern tip of Africa, which would add about a week to the travel.
READ: Egypt’s Suez Canal: A History of the Key Route
But the president of the Suez Canal Authority told the media that despite the blockade, some shipments were able to move south and that efforts to dislodge Ever Given would continue.
Consulting firm Wood Mackenzie said the biggest impact was on container shipping, but there were also a total of 16 oil tankers and loaded products that had to navigate through the canal and now delayed by the incident, amounting to 870,000 tons of crude oil and 670,000 tons of clean crude. petroleum products such as gasoline, gasoline and diesel.
