On March 29, local time, a 400-meter-long heavy-duty container freighter was stuck in the Suez Canal channel for 7 days and was still not out of trouble.
At present, although the Egyptian Suez Canal authorities are stepping up rescue work for the stranded giant cargo ship, the cargo ship has not been completely relieved of the problem.
According to two sources from the Suez Canal Administration, after the sand was excavated from the vicinity of the freighter and the tugboat performed push-pull operations, the rescue work made slight progress on the 27th. The stern of the ship moved a little distance and will try again at the next high tide.
There are a total of 18,300 containers on this freighter. Although Egyptian President Sisi has ordered some of the containers to be unloaded, sources from the Canal Authority said that the unloading and weight reduction operations will not be launched immediately.
Experts have warned that the unloading procedure can be complicated and time-consuming.
But if forced to adopt this strategy, Egypt will accept international assistance offers.
According to Reuters, the Suez Canal lost between 13 million and 14 million U.S. dollars in revenue every day due to stranded and blocked shipping.
At present, more than 300 ships have been unable to pass normally near the canal, and important goods and sensitive products worth billions of dollars have been backlogged.
(Producing Li Jiali)
Editor in charge: [Ji Xiang]