Egypt starts dredging works to expand southern entrance of Suez Canal

 

CAIRO – 16 May 2021: Egypt started on Saturday the dredging work to expand the southern entrance of the Suez Canal few weeks after the accident of the Panama-flagged Ever Given ship that went aground in the southern entrance and caused the suspension of the world trade shipping through the canal for six days.

 

The Suez Canal Authority said in a statement that two dredgers (the 10th of Ramadan Dredger and Mashhur dredgers) have been used in the expansion works at 122 kilometers of the Suez Canal. 

 

In his speech at an inauguration ceremony for a number of projects affiliated to the Suez Canal Authority on May 11, Chairman of Suez Canal Authority Admiral Osama Rabie highlighted digging parallel passages from the 132nd kilometer to the 162nd kilometer lying in the southern section of the international waterway near the Suez Gulf, and from the 122nd kilometer to the 132nd kilometer located in the Bitter Lakes. The parallel passages will be on the western side of the Canal. 

 

 

Those to be added to the parallel Suez Canal introduced in 2015 extending over 72 kilometers. Similarly, the authority is also enlarging the depth from 127 meters to 172 meters.

 

 

On March 23, the Ever-Given ship went aground in the 151 km of the Suez Canal, where the vessels in both directions pass, causing the suspension of the international maritime navigation through the canal for six days.

 

After it was freed on March 29, the ship was escorted to the Bitter Lakes for technical inspection, crew interrogation, and black box analysis. Since then, the ship is still in the Lakes until reaching an agreement between the authority and the shipowners on compensation for the costs of the accident.

 

Additional reporting by Noha El Tawil