MANAMA: The US Navy’s Fifth Fleet will deploy its specialist assets to assist Egypt in clearing the world’s costliest traffic jam blocking the Suez Canal.
A giant container ship, Ever Given, turned sideways in the narrow waterway due to poor weather conditions and navigation issues last Tuesday, blocking the world’s busiest shipping channel linking Asia and Europe.
Efforts to dislodge the Japanese-owned giant container ship continue with more than 20,000 tonnes of sand removed by dredgers from around its bow with the help of a Dutch firm.
The vessel, a 220,000-tonnes marine monster nearly a quarter mile long with a 20,000-container capacity, is disrupting billions of dollars’ worth of goods, which shipping journal Lloyd’s List translates to about $400 million per hour.
The blockage could cost global trade $6 billion to $10bn a week, a study by German insurer Allianz showed on Friday.
The US Navy in the Middle East has stepped in to help different teams working and advising authorities to how best to move the 400m ship that has wedged itself diagonally.
“We have offered and stand ready to assist Egypt and will look to support any specific request we receive,” US Central Command spokesman Captain Bill Urban told the GDN yesterday.
The Bahrain-based Marine Emergency Mutual Aid Centre - Bahrain was also following up the incident, despite the issue being outside its jurisdiction.
Around 15 per cent of world shipping traffic transits the canal and hundreds of vessels are waiting to pass through the waterway once the blockage has been cleared.
Reports indicated yesterday that more than 320 vessels were waiting to enter or continue their transit through the canal.
Those included dozens of container ships, bulk carriers and liquefied natural gas (LNG) or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) vessels.
Shipping rates for oil product tankers nearly doubled after the ship became stranded and efforts to free the giant vessel may take weeks and be complicated by unstable weather, threatening costly delays for companies already dealing with Covid-19 restrictions.
Meanwhile, the ship moved slightly yesterday, but it was unclear when it will refloat.
Efforts to dislodge the giant container ship have allowed its stern and rudder to move, the head of the canal authority said yesterday.
Suez Canal Authority (SCA) chairman Osama Rabie said he hoped it would not be necessary to remove some of the 18,300 containers to lighten the ship’s load, but that strong tides and winds were complicating efforts to free it.
“The ship’s stern began to move towards Suez, and that was a positive sign, but the tide fell significantly and we stopped,” Rabie said. “We expect that at any time the ship could slide and move from the spot it is in.”
Tugging attempts restarted yesterday and further steps will be taken today, SCA sources said, though they added it could be necessary to remove more sand from around the ship to free it.
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