NEW DELHI, Mar 29: Shipping traffic through Egypt’s Suez Canal resumed on Monday after a giant container ship “Ever Given,” which was stuck sideways and had been blocking the busy waterway for almost a week, was refloated, the canal authority said.
The 400-metre long Ever Given became jammed diagonally across a southern section of the canal in high winds early last Tuesday, halting traffic on the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.
“She’s free,” an official involved in the salvage operation said.
After dredging and excavation work over the weekend, rescue workers from the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) and a team from Dutch firm Smit Salvage succeeded in partially refloating her early on Monday using tug boats, sources said.
Sources said helped by the peak of high tide, a flotilla of tugboats managed to wrench the bow of the skyscraper-sized “Ever Given” from the sandy bank of the crucial waterway, where it had been firmly lodged since last Tuesday.
Tugboats were pulling the vessel toward the Great Bitter Lake, in the middle of the waterway, where it will undergo inspections.
Efforts to completely free her continued throughout the day.
At least 369 vessels are waiting to transit the canal, including dozens of container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers and liquefied natural gas (LNG) or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) vessels.
The SCA has said it can accelerate convoys through the canal once the Ever Given is freed. “We will not waste one second,” The SCA said it could take from two-and-a-half to three days to clear the backlog, and the canal source said more than 100 ships would be able to enter the channel daily.
(Manas Dasgupta)
