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Tug in front of the "Ever Given": "80 percent in the right direction"
Photo: - / dpa
After the liberation of the container ship "Ever Given", which was stuck in the Suez Canal, it should take several days for shipping traffic to normalize.
Once the ship has been completely recovered, the canal will immediately "work 24 hours a day," said the head of the Egyptian Canal Authority (SCA), Osama Rabie, on local television on Monday.
Nevertheless, it will still take "around three and a half days" until the traffic jam in front of the entrances to the shipping route clears up.
Rabie did not comment on when exactly the recovery process in the Suez Canal will be completed.
The "Ever Given" got into a sandstorm last week and ran aground.
The 400 meter long ship was then stuck across the narrow channel.
Federal Transport Minister Andreas Scheuer has not yet seen the all-clear.
The CSU politician told the German Press Agency: "After the direct feedback from the site, the ship is not yet free."
The bow is still sitting on sand.
Another suction excavator, which is supposed to wash away the sand under the bow, should arrive on Tuesday.
In the course of the day, at high tide, another attempt should be made to tow the ship free.
On Monday morning, the container ship was partially freed and almost completely turned back in the right direction.
The stern of the freighter has meanwhile moved 102 meters from the shore, said SCA boss Rabie on Monday.
Previously, the stern was only four meters from the bank.
The "Ever Given" had been turned "80 percent in the right direction," explained Rabie.
Now the rescue workers are hoping that the coming tide will raise the ship by the crucial centimeters.
Efforts by the Egyptian canal authority SCA have been in full swing since Wednesday to get the "Ever Given" free again.
Most recently, almost 400 ships with cargo worth billions of dollars have been stowed on both sides of the canal.
Every day that the Suez Canal remains blocked, according to a report by the insurer Allianz, world trade costs between six and ten billion dollars.
According to the canal authority SCA, Egypt loses between $ 12 million and $ 14 million per day of closure.
The spokesman for the Hamburg container shipping company Hapag Lloyd, Nils Haupt, was "enormously relieved" about the success in rescuing the giant container.
"Because, a few days longer and the damage would have been even greater," he said in an interview with Bayerischer Rundfunk.
Hapag Lloyd is assuming that "the first ships" will be able to pass through the Suez Canal in the next 24 hours.
"And then we hope that all ships will move in the next six to eight days." The Hamburg shipping company currently has eight ships in the Suez Canal.
mik / dpa / AFP
