The crisis of the giant container ship’s stranding in the Suez Canal, the halting of shipping traffic, and the accumulation of hundreds of ships in one of the most important waterways in the world, highlighted a worrying fact, which is the possibility of re-closing the Suez Canal again if a similar crisis occurs.

Of course, experts believe that the accident cannot be unrepeatable.

However, what must be worked on is to avoid closing the Suez Canal for several days, as happened in the crisis of the ship "EVER GIVEN", by preparing and providing equipment to face such incidents, especially with the great development in the manufacture of giant ships.

Perhaps this is what the Egyptian President, Abdel Fattah El-Sisi indicated, that lessons and lessons must be drawn from experience, stressing the need to expedite the purchase of equipment and supplies that the Suez Canal Authority needs to face this kind of crisis, which affected the global trade movement.

It seems that Al-Sisi realized the extent of the anxiety caused by the closure of the canal for days, as he said during his inspection of the Suez Canal on Wednesday, the need to reassure the world of the regularity of navigation in the canal, and to purchase the necessary equipment immediately regardless of the cost;

To keep pace with the development in the movement and manufacture of giant ships.

The need for this equipment became evident after the ship's owner sought help from a Dutch company specialized in the field of rescue, which helped strongly in accomplishing the mission and rid the world of the nightmare that stopped its trade, and the accumulation of its losses in addition to Egypt's loss from the suspension of the Suez Canal, according to observers.

On one note, the Egyptian media came out attacking the "# Reuters" agency, but they soon found themselves calling for an apology pic.twitter.com/eI6oGpHa0C

- Al Jazeera Egypt (@AJA_Egypt) March 30, 2021

After the "Evergiven" ship stranded ... Egypt is considering expanding the Suez Canal to avoid new accidents to


bypass the blockage |

https://t.co/VaXlaLOHEjhttps://t.co/OYOQTgedo7

- Al Jazeera Mubasher (@ajmubasher) April 2, 2021

Channel expansion

Egypt promised to study the expansion of the Suez Canal in order to avoid incidents similar to the stranding of the ship "Evergiven", according to the head of the Suez Canal Authority, Osama Rabie, especially in areas where there is no duplication, as in the southern entrance where the last accident occurred.

However, Rabie said in statements to the US channel, "CNN", last Thursday, that the channel "does not need an increase in its depth (reaching 24 meters)."

The length of the canal is 193 kilometers, and it consists of two parallel waterways in its north.

But it is limited to one corridor in the south with a width of 345 meters, which is the part in which the ship of the shipping line "EVER GREEN" ran aground, with a length of 400 meters and a width of 59 meters, and a payload of 224 thousand tons.

Until now, the real reasons behind the stranding of the giant ship are still unknown, unlike what was officially announced at the beginning of the crisis, when a statement by the Suez Canal Authority spoke about the lack of visibility and the intensity of wind speed as reasons for the giant ship’s stranding and the occurrence of the crisis, which resulted in the closure of the canal. About 12% of the global trade volume passes through it, for about a week.

Egypt was flooded with offers from Turkey, Russia and America to help reshape the large ship, which confirms that these countries have greater and stronger equipment and capabilities to deal with such crises, even though they do not have a vital canal like the Suez Canal.

Observers believe that the company’s use of the ship’s owner by one of the Dutch companies specialized in the field of rescue hastened the accomplishment of the mission, ridding the world of the nightmare that stopped its trade, and the accumulation of its losses in addition to Egypt's loss from the stopping of the Suez Canal.

Learn the lesson

In his estimation, the global energy and oil expert, Dr. Mamdouh Salama, says, "Egypt has succeeded in solving the tanker problem thanks to the huge expertise and equipment available to it. Nevertheless, this gives a lesson of the importance of taking precautions when passing huge tankers of this type to prevent any human error or Technician, wait when there are strong winds and sand whirlwinds. "

He explained to Al-Jazeera Net that "the lesson that the Suez Canal Authority will take is to modernize its equipment, invest and purchase additional equipment capable of dealing in the future with ships of this type," noting that "Egypt's liberation of the ship in only 6 days had a mitigating effect." Damages to its economy, the world economy and oil prices. "

For his part, the consultant in strategic management and crisis management, Dr. Murad Ali, said, “There is what is called the prevention phase or the pre-crisis phase, and it includes 4 phases, the first is to analyze the risks and their probability, secondly to develop scenarios so that we can prepare them, and thirdly to pay attention to alarm detection systems. "It is early to deal with the crisis early, and to train and qualify a team to be ready if the danger occurs, and to provide it with the necessary capabilities."

He explained that when applying this stage to the ship's delinquency crisis, it becomes clear that it could have been prevented by not allowing the ship to enter the canal under bad weather, and therefore the continuation of its passage was an error that could be prevented if there were correct procedures in the risk management stage, which is some stage. Before crisis management.

Ali added, explaining that the channel's revenues are between 5 to 6 billion dollars annually, and this raises a serious question: Does the channel, with its financial and human capabilities, fail to provide the necessary equipment and adequate training instead of using experts and equipment from the Netherlands?

Where we were supposed to have institutes specialized in training and graduating such technicians and exporting that service abroad.

Poverty of thought

In turn, the former Egyptian parliamentarian, Mohamed Massad, expressed his belief that "there is a management crisis in Egypt in general, and the delinquency crisis of the ship in the Suez Canal is part of it or a result of it, because the equipment and capabilities necessary to face it were not available."

Speaking to Al-Jazeera Net, he added, in the 2012 parliament, a committee from the Suez Canal Authority visited us, and the dialogue and discussion was about developing the canal, expanding and deepening it, and turning it into a huge logistical center.

Massaad pointed out that most of the channel’s entities are losing companies, and Egypt only benefits from traffic fees, and this is the reason for the absence of any development or modernization of equipment except for cutting the branch in 2015, which wasted more than 64 billion pounds, and did not generate any real financial returns. There was no qualitative shift in the management of the channel.

Who swam # the delinquent ship?! ... Watch the truth with Nasser # Egypt_Alharda pic.twitter.com/FbsMAigiWs

- Complain Satellite Channel (@mekameleentv) March 30, 2021

Dutch company

On the other hand, some on social media criticized the media and the state's disregard for the great role that the Dutch company and its experts played in ending the crisis, which closed the most important shipping artery in the world.

And they considered in numerous posts and tweets that the recognition of the Dutch company’s role will not in any way reduce the effort of workers, experts and officials of the Suez Canal Authority.

After two days of unsuccessful attempts, a Dutch ship belonging to Smit Salvage, which specializes in rescuing the stricken ships, joined the rescue efforts, as it played a major role in contributing to an end to the crisis.

According to Le Parisien newspaper, quoting Mirko Galliano, professor of history at Campbell University, USA, Smet Salvage - which was founded in 1842 in the Netherlands - worked a lot in the oil field, where large platforms require special capabilities.

The media spokesperson for the Suez Canal Authority, it had been published on its page, giving good news to the arrival of the Dutch "monster" and is proud that its force (285 tons), the agent "Samsung", deleted the post because it embarrasses Sisi, but it spread widely, as it was published on the seventh day of "intelligence" Hind was forced to return it as a picture in her account!

pic.twitter.com/KU2WduLtvU

- Jamal Sultan (@ GamalSultan1) March 30, 2021

Congratulations to Egypt and the world at the end of the ship crisis that disrupted navigation in the Suez Canal,


but an important question remains: What will Egypt lose if the Sisi regime stops lying to the people, and thanked the technical team from the Dutch rescue company SMIT who supervised the floatation of the ship, as it is fixed Suez Canal Authority website?

- wael kandil (@ waiel65) March 29, 2021

Egyptian anger forces the Saudi Al-Hadath channel, which operates from the UAE, to delete this report.


The Egyptians considered the report an insult to the Egyptian efforts to solve the problem of the stranded ship in the Suez Canal, and that it was the Dutch company that succeeded in solving the problem.

Video link before posting https://t.co/aFv1poT6su pic.twitter.com/WTKX6dYYpc

- Abdul Salam Al-Rajhi (@rajhi_ly) March 30, 2021

The magnitude of the damage

It remains that the coming days will show more damage resulting from stopping navigation in the canal for about a week. According to Fitch Ratings, "accidents involving large container ships could cause claims of more than one billion dollars. These are mostly linked to the rescue and the ship's arrival at its final destination. "

A report by the "Allianz" insurance company, said that a one-day disruption in the transport of goods, as a result of stopping navigation in the canal, "costs global trade from 6 to 10 billion dollars," as quoted by the French Press Agency.

In Egypt, the head of the Suez Canal Authority, Lieutenant General Osama Rabie, said earlier that the authority had set the cost of losses between 12 and 15 million dollars per day, and that the body responsible for compensation will be determined after the completion of investigations into the accident.