The Suez canal mishap

Back in our school days we had heard of Suez canal and how its introduction had dramatically altered the economics of sea-freight movements. An engineering marvel, this iconic waterway has been instrumental in shortening the sea journey between Asia and Europe by almost 10 days in today's terms. Being an avid reader of Jules Verne's science-fiction, his novel 'Twenty thousand leagues under the sea' had firmly etched in my mind the possibilities of how such canals could considerably shorten distances and ease transport of goods and passengers.

All of this was forgotten until a few days ago when the news came of a container ship - nearly quarter mile long and weighing 200,000 metric tonnes blocked the canal after gusty winds rammed it against the canal boundaries. With every passing minute since then, the world's attention has been fixated on how to get this ship unstuck and free up the canal for transport movements once again.

Given below is a link to an article that vividly explains the issue on hand and what it means for the world economy.

Suez Canal ship stuck: How did Ever Given get stuck? (usatoday.com)