New Delhi: Ever Given, a vessel of Taiwan-owned MV has blocked the Suez Canal in Egypt causing a pile of more than 100 vessels waiting to go through. Suez Canal is an artificially built sea-level waterway and around 50 vessels go through it on an average.
The giant container ship ran aground after it went off course due to a gust of wind, the vessel’s operator said Wednesday, this has halted the marine traffic on one of the world’s busiest trade routes.
A photo posted Tuesday shows the 400-metre- (1,300-foot-)long and 59-metre wide vessel, blocking the traffic as it is lodged sideways. Excavation trucks also struggled to dig it out.
#SuezCanal blocked #Evergreen ship #TheGuardian news video pic.twitter.com/TAyPs0ApD0
— Shiraf (@Shiraf786) March 24, 2021
“The container accidentally ran aground after a suspected gust of wind hit it,” ship operator Evergreen Marine Corp said in a statement to AFP.
“The company has urged the shipowner to report the cause of the incident and has been in discussions with relevant parties including the canal management authority to assist the ship as soon as possible.”, said spokesperson of Evergreen.
Talking to AFP, Alok Roy, fleet director of BSM Hong Kong said, “There was a grounding incident”. BSM is the ship manager of Ever Given. ship manager.
Instagram user Julianne Cona posted a photo of the grounded ship from the Maersk Denver, now also stuck behind the Ever Given.
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Julianne captioned the post as, “Ship in front of us ran aground while going through the canal and is now stuck sideways,” she wrote. “Looks like we might be here for a little bit.”
Vessel Finder, a shipping website said the ship was en route to Rotterdam, Netherlands, but it was unclear why the vessel stopped moving.
“Tug boats are currently trying to re-float the vessel,” Leth Agencies, which provides crossing services to clients using the canal, said on Twitter.
Significance
The canal offers vessels a more direct and time-saving route between the North Atlantic and northern Indian ocean via the Mediterranean and Red seas.
Thus, avoiding the South Atlantic and southern Indian oceans and reducing the journey distance. For example the distance between the Arabian Sea and London is reduced by approximately 8,900 kilometres because of this canal.
The Suez Canal was dug more than 150 years ago and is one of the world’s most important trade routes. The canal provides passage to 10 percent of all international maritime trade.
According to the data of Suez Canal Authority (SCA), around 19,000 ships passed through this 193 km-long canal in 2020, carrying more than one billion tonnes of cargo.
The canal has also helped the struggling economy of Egypt in recent years, as the country earned around $5.61 billion in revenues from the canal last year.
President of Egypt, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi unveiled his plans of expanding the canal in 2015. His idea was to reduce waiting time for the ships and also double the amount of daily traffic by 2023.
Earlier this year, President Sisi ordered his cabinet to adopt a “flexible marketing policy” for the canal in order to cope with the economic loss caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Egyptian authorities are yet to comment on this incident.
