The mammoth cargo ship blocking the
Suez Canal was wrenched from the shoreline and finally set free Monday, raising
hopes that one of the world’s most vital maritime routes would quickly rebound
and limit the fallout of a disruption that had paralyzed billions of dollars in
global trade.
اضافة اعلان
Suez Canal Authority Chairman said if the current pace continues, the
backlog could be cleared in three-and-a-half days.
Within hours, other ships awaiting transit through the 193km-long waterway that
connects the Mediterranean and Red Seas fired up their engines and began moving
again.
Salvage teams, working on land and water for six days and nights, were
ultimately assisted by the moon and the tides.
The ship, the quarter-mile-long Ever Given, was ultimately set free around 3pm.,
according to shipping officials. Horns blared in celebration as images emerged
on social media of the once stuck ship on the move.
“We pulled it off!” Peter Berdowski, CEO of Royal Boskalis Westminster, a Dutch
maritime salvage company hired by the vessel’s owner, said in a statement.
The
success, he said, had made “free passage through the Suez Canal possible
again.”
With a full moon Sunday, the following 24 hours had offered the best window to
work, with a few extra inches of tidal flow providing a vital assist for their
efforts.
Throughout the night Sunday and into Monday, tugboats worked in coordination
with dredgers to return the 220,000-ton vessel to the water.
Then, just before dawn, the ship slowly regained buoyancy.
It was a turning point in one of the largest and most intense salvage
operations in modern history, with the smooth functioning of the global trading
system hanging in the balance.
Assisted by a flotilla of tugboats, the ship was towed north to the Great
Bitter Lake, the widest part of the 193km-long waterway, so it could be further
inspected and so delayed traffic could once gain flow smoothly.
Leth Agencies, a shipping services provider that specializes in canal passages,
said on Twitter that with the Ever Given now safely out of the way, 43 other
vessels awaiting southbound transit at Great Bitter Lake had resumed their
voyages toward the Red Sea end of the canal.
But with hundreds of ships backed up on either side, it could be days before
operations return to normal.
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