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Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

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Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#271
post #47

According to the Twitter feed there is now a excavator trying to dig out the bow. It really shows off the scale as the excavator looks like a tiny toy next to the massive container ship. https://twitter.com/jsrailton/status/1374468169784459267/pho...

Uhhh it's in Wikipedia's "largest container ships" list! [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_container_ship...

True, but it is hard to get the scale of some ships until a real world item people are familiar with is close enough for a comparison.

I remember driving up to one of the battleship memorials as a child and it just seemed like this big gray mountain at the end of the street.

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#272

I guess it won't be too hard to unjam it, but imagine how the world would change if it does get stuck, everyone would now have to go around Africa, probably boosting a few African economies. A bit like how a tiny bat (citation needed?) changed the course of the world for at least a year.

Bulk teleportation startups would see increased interest.

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#274
post #52

If you go to vesselfinder you can follow the drama in real-time! Seems it's still stuck: https://www.vesselfinder.com/?imo=9811000

Cool. It even shows the 7 tugs trying to help.

I was looking up how hard can a tug tug. Wikipedia seems to imply 65 tons is normal.

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#275

Compare the red/black line on the ship's hull and the water line. Under normal conditions, the red/black line is parallel to the water across the length of the ship: https://www.google.com/search?q=evergreen+ever+given&source=... In this picture of the ship stuck in the Suez, the red/black line appears to tilt noticeably upwards towards the bow: https://twitter.com/marceldirsus/status/1374480496789393412 If this isn'…

The bulbous bow seems pretty jammed into the side

https://twitter.com/jsrailton/status/1374597391463120896

It has gone in with some force.

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#276
post #101

Tengential but I am always curious what software these huge logistics company use to manage their business. From my outsider's perspective, it seems like a best-in-class-software enabled company would have a massive advantage over the rest. Interested to hear if anyone has insights about this

In 2016 John Willis was with Docker and he gave a talk where he casually recommended a book called The Box [1] about how shipping containers have shaped the modern world. When I was reading it there was a part where they talk about how the logistics optimization problem caused the major shippers to be some of the earliest adopters of computers. Interesting book. [1] - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/316767.The_Bo…

The podcast "Containers" also covers how shipping containers have shaped the mordern world — well worth a listen, though I don't recall it mentioning this aspect of their logistics.

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#277
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uhhh it's in Wikipedia's "largest container ships" list! [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_container_ship...

In 2016, Prokopowicz and Berg-Andreassen defined a container ship with a capacity of 10,000 to 20,000 TEU as a Very Large Container Ship (VLCS), while that with a capacity greater than 20,000 TEU as an Ultra Large Container Ship (ULCS) They are gonna run out of larger adjectives pretty soon.

Well in frequency terminology they’ve still got Super Large, Extremely Large and Terrifically Large left!

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the ships have unused cabins, and some shipping companies allow civilians to book them as a sort of quirky cruise experience. There is quite a lot of paperwork involved, and you need to book fairly far in advance, but it's totally doable if you have the cash and the time. When I went it cost around us$100 per night. Going from Europe to Asia takes 3-4 weeks, I think going around the world (both Suez and Panam…

I had no clue - this is fascinating. Do you mind sharing who you booked with?

My parents traveled on container ships quite a few times (twice to NZ and OZ). Trips are typically booked through specialised travel agents (you can find them quite easily via Google). There is quite a community of people doing these trips, mainly pensioners, because you need to have time and can't be sure about timing.

For those thinking about doing it, the Asia/Africa routes from Europe are much more interesting. Going across the Atlantic or Pacific is much less interesting. Also in the modern age of container freight you don't have much time at the ports, and often the captains are reluctant to let you get off, because they are on such tight schedule and delays would quickly cost 100s of 1000s of dollars per hour (that will give you an idea about the economic impact of this blockage).

My mother actually travelled on a loose cargo freighter in the 90s. That was a completely different experience because you would often have several days or a week at port.

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless I’m very much mistaken, the Suez is in Egypt, so the detour would be around Africa.

Considering the threat from Nigeria pirates, they probably will just wait until everything resolves.

? This is the first time I hear about Nigerian pirates. The problem several years ago were Somalian pirates, which incidentally are next to the Suez route.

Re: Suez canal blocked by a massive ship

#280

According to the Twitter feed there is now a excavator trying to dig out the bow. It really shows off the scale as the excavator looks like a tiny toy next to the massive container ship. https://twitter.com/jsrailton/status/1374468169784459267/pho...

I feel so much empathy for "the little excavator that could"
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