Ship blocking the Suez Canal freed

BarcelonaAfter six days aground, the Ever Given, the huge 400-metre cargo ship weighing 220,000 tons stranded in the Suez Canal has been refloated early this morning, according to several reports, so that the circulation in this crucial route for maritime trade could be recovered soon. According to Reuters, the vessel has been freed, the engines have been started and final checks are being made before it can be manoeuvred. It is unclear when the ship will be able to move and resume traffic in the canal. Each day of blockage costs over €8bn.

Videos posted on social media show the ship surrounded by tugboats and in the middle of the canal, in contrast to images showing it with its bow stuck on the east side.

This has also been confirmed by Inchape, a maritime service provider on Twitter, which explains that at 4:30 a.m. the ship could be refloated and is being secured.

Osama Rabie, chairman of the Canal Authority, had assured a few hours earlier that the ship "had been partially released". Up to 17 tugboats worked all night, while sand was dredged from the bottom of the canal, and water was pumped out of the ballast tanks to refloat the ship and move it.

Pressed by the costs of the blockade of the Suez Canal, Egyptian, Dutch and Japanese teams have been working against the clock to free the mega-ship stranded on the fastest route between Europe and Asia. Engineers had already announced on Sunday that they hoped a full moon and a high tide would help refloat the Ever Given. On Saturday, after dredging tons of sand and with the force of 14 tugboats, the mega-ship could be minimally righted about 17 metres, turning it 20 degrees and freeing the stern and rudder from the bottom. On Sunday Rabie had reported that water was beginning to circulate under the hull. But the Egyptian rais Abdelfatah Al-Sissi ordered to start unloading the containers, which meant that the operation could take weeks.

The manoeuvres were delicate because the ship could become unbalanced or even break. Each high tide was an opportunity to free the ship and allow traffic in the canal again, but every low tide meant more danger. The diving teams, however, have so far not noticed any damage to the hull.

Meanwhile, the bottleneck in the canal is already causing problems for international trade: as many as 369 ships are floating at either end of the canal, in the Mediterranean or the Red Sea. They are carrying all kinds of goods, from live animals to cars or computers. Some have already decided not to wait any longer and have embarked on the 9,000-kilometre route around the whole of Africa via the Cape of Good Hope. The cost of fuel alone is 22,000 euros per day. Analysts say that if the traffic can be restored early next week, the shipping industry can absorb the costs, but if it takes longer they predict major disruptions on a global scale

Syria rations fuel

After ten years of a devastating war and still under the dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad, Syria is suffering a catastrophic economic situation, which has worsened with the pandemic, to the extent that much of the population has difficulty getting bread. Damascus announced on Saturday that the blockade of Suez had prevented the arrival of a ship loaded with fuel from its ally, Iran, and that gasoline will have to be rationed in order to ensure the functioning of essential services, such as bread ovens and hospitals. According to the oil ministry, the ship was to have arrived on Friday at the port of Banias, and if the blockade persists, it will have to change its route. Until the war, Syria had energy autonomy, with a daily oil production of 400,000 barrels, which in 2019 plummeted to 24,000. Ninety percent of the reserves are in the area controlled by the Kurds, in the region of Deir al-Zor, beyond the regime's reach.