Stuck ship finally freed in Suez Canal

The cargo ship MV Glory, which arrived in China and previously ran aground in Egypt’s Suez Canal, has now been released, AP News reported. A brief traffic disruption in the canal commemorated the 2021 Ever Given event.

At the time, the 1,312-foot(400-meter) container ship Ever Given ran aground in a channel approximately 984 feet (300 meters) wide.

The ship was stuck across the channel, backing up sea traffic in both directions and affecting the global shipping industry.
The Suez Canal in Egypt, opened in 1869, provides a sea connection between Europe and Asia, enabling faster transportation of oil, natural gas, and goods. Later built with the help of a million workers, the Suez Canal is one of Egypt’s biggest sources of income and was significantly expanded in 2015 to accommodate the world’s largest ships.

 

A ship runs aground in the Suez Canal.

The MV Glory ran aground earlier today at a depth of 738 feet (225 meters), according to the ship’s Greek operator’s website. It is a fairly small ship that transported 65,000 tons of corn from Ukraine to China. The MV Glory is a cargo ship, meaning it carries bulk cargo such as grain.
Near the city of Qantara on the Suez Canal in the province of Ismailia, the ship experienced an unexpected technical failure, according to Bloomberg. One of its engine cylinders developed a mechanical problem that kept the ship out of action for four hours today after reaching the northern end of the channel.


Canal service company Leth Agencies reported that the MW Glory was against the west bank of the canal, pointing south, and not wedged across the canal. Three tugs, Port Said, Svitzer Suez 1, and Ali Shalabi, were pressed into action and managed to raise the ship at 10 a.m. Egypt time.
About 20 southbound ships were stopped after the incident and allowed to resume their journey an hour later.

 

Quick lessons

In addition to making global news, the Ever Given incident caused a blockade estimated to cost $9 billion a day in global trade and strained supply chains. The Suez Canal authorities were determined to prevent similar incidents from occurring again and quickly began work to widen and deepen the ship’s blocked passage.


However, the tanker Affinity V, about the same size as the MV Glory, ran aground near Ever Given for a week. After a few hours, canal authorities pushed the tugs into traffic and lifted the tanker back into position.


Like MV Glory, Affinity V suffered a mechanical failure while passing the channel and had to seek tug assistance to reach the nearest port. The canal authorities certainly seemed to have mastered the role of tugboats in getting these ships back to the surface.
With the Suez Canal expected to add another canal in the near future, such events are unlikely to have the same impact as the landing of Everest.

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