The Suez Canal, one of the main waterways in the world, has been blocked since yesterday due to a mega-container that ran aground and it could take days to remove it allowing traffic to resume. This was reported by various media, including the Bbc. Several vessels were mobilized to help the 400-meter long, 59-wide “Ever Given” freighter, which ran aground north of the port of Suez probably due to a strong wind and with potential worldwide repercussions.
The container ship is registered in Panama and went to Rotterdam coming from China, specifies the website of the Bbc. It ran aground at around 07:40 local time yesterday blocking the navigation of “dozens” of other freighters. It is operated by the Taiwanese company Evergreen Marine which allegedly explained the grounding with a “sudden rush of strong wind”, the site reports.
A US-based shipping historian, Sal Mercogliano, said the Ever Given “is the largest ship to have run aground in the Suez Canal” and the rare case could have “enormous repercussions for world trade.” Reporting the agency Bloomberg, The site of Al Arabiya defines “probable” that the blockade of the Canal will trigger “a wave of disruptions in the global energy supply chain.”
If it is not possible to free the cargo by exploiting a high tide, it will be necessary to remove the containers, Mercogliano predicted. A manager at the Suez Canal Authority warned that the operations to clear the Ever Given, which include the removal of large quantities of sand around the ship, could “take days,” writes the Bbc summarizing what is reported by the site Cairo24.
In 2017, however, a Japanese container that ran aground due to mechanical breakdowns blocking the canal was put back into navigation after only “hours” with the use of tugs, the site recalls. The strategic navigable artificial waterway excavated to the west of the Sinai peninsula connects the Mediterranean with the Red Sea and allows navigation from Europe to Asia avoiding circumnavigating Africa on the Cape of Good Hope route.