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Is that ship still stuck?

istheshipstillstuck.com

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Re: Is that ship still stuck?

#371
post #272
post #39

I don't think people are giving enough credit to how stuck the ship is. Look at some of the photos of the front of it. Look at how far out of the water it is sitting. The ship might look like that if it were totally empty, but not when it is full of containers like this. Some people saying: just drag it off of the sand. Okay! And what happens when that causes you to rip a hole into the hull of the ship? Now it's real…

> It's really stuck. It's probably going to take a couple of weeks to get it unstuck. My armchair engineering would dump a load of salt into the water to increase buoyancy of the ship long enough for the tugs to get some momentum with less effort than currently. That would be my cheap try solution to help the tugs that have already hit there limit so why not change the physics and add a load of salt.

And how much salt would you need? At least 100kg per m3. Assuming the canal is 250m wide you need a 400m section dammed and average depth is 15m then you need 150 thousand tonnes of salt. Thankfully Egypt produces more than 3 million tonnes of salt per year so just a few weeks worth of production and enough to fill a large bulk carrier ship.

Re: Is that ship still stuck?

#373
post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's really stuck. It's probably going to take a couple of weeks to get it unstuck. My armchair engineering would dump a load of salt into the water to increase buoyancy of the ship long enough for the tugs to get some momentum with less effort than currently. That would be my cheap try solution to help the tugs that have already hit there limit so why not change the physics and add a load of salt.

You could increase the buoyancy by something like 230 kilograms per cubic meter if you fully saturate it on a hot day, but I suppose you'd have to dam up both sides to keep the brine from washing away.

At this scale, even air pressure would be a factor, I'd presume a higher air pressure would be more conducive as large surface area of the water than the ship, though might be wrong.

Re: Is that ship still stuck?

#374
post #39

I don't think people are giving enough credit to how stuck the ship is. Look at some of the photos of the front of it. Look at how far out of the water it is sitting. The ship might look like that if it were totally empty, but not when it is full of containers like this. Some people saying: just drag it off of the sand. Okay! And what happens when that causes you to rip a hole into the hull of the ship? Now it's real…

Could you build a temporary barrier around the ship and the section of the canal, bring in some massive pumps, and temporarily raise the water level around the ship? Edit: Something like this https://www.hydrologicalsolutions.com/aqua-barrier-cofferdam...

Imagine the pressures on the temporary barrier too, and what a failure would mean. Even bigger disaster.

Re: Is that ship still stuck?

#376
post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's really stuck. It's probably going to take a couple of weeks to get it unstuck. My armchair engineering would dump a load of salt into the water to increase buoyancy of the ship long enough for the tugs to get some momentum with less effort than currently. That would be my cheap try solution to help the tugs that have already hit there limit so why not change the physics and add a load of salt.

You could increase the buoyancy by something like 230 kilograms per cubic meter if you fully saturate it on a hot day, but I suppose you'd have to dam up both sides to keep the brine from washing away.

Would that level of salinity be harmful once it reaches the sea?

Re: Is that ship still stuck?

#377
post #263
post #39

I don't think people are giving enough credit to how stuck the ship is. Look at some of the photos of the front of it. Look at how far out of the water it is sitting. The ship might look like that if it were totally empty, but not when it is full of containers like this. Some people saying: just drag it off of the sand. Okay! And what happens when that causes you to rip a hole into the hull of the ship? Now it's real…

Lloyd's List estimated that every day Suez is closed costs US$9 billion ($400 million per hour). If it could be done technically and open up the canal, it would be cheaper for insurance companies to buy the ship, it's cargo, buy all nearby property and then blow the whole ship up.

I was wondering how far I'd have to scroll down this thread to get to the "does Egypt have any nukes?" solution.

Re: Is that ship still stuck?

#378
Moving sand is easier than moving a ship+20K containers or removing the 20K containers in hopes of refloating the ship.

So the easiest solution would be to widen the canal at this point - where the ship is currently located and where the ship will need to go as it refloats and turns. Move the banks further back. In effect create a place with enough room for a ship of this size to turnaround.

The canal isn't that deep. Dredgers can be brought on both banks in front and behind the ship. Four dredging teams ought to knock this out pretty quickly.

Re: Is that ship still stuck?

#380
post #120
post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

do you mean this case? https://www.mopo.de/hamburg/frachter-rammt-faehre-knapp-an-d... that was the very same ship EDIT: no, the incident needing 12 tugs was a different ship. see comment below.

I don't read German, but I can find reports of the same SIZE chip getting stuck on the Elbe and requiring 12 tugs to free it. The ship was called the CSCL Indian Ocean.

yep, thanks

>On February 3, 2016 CSCL Indian Ocean grounded in the River Elbe, while approaching Hamburg, Germany. Her rudder controls were reported to have malfunctioned. It took almost a week to free her from the sandbank, because she grounded at high-tide. Her fuel was unloaded, and she was finally freed, February 9, six days later, during the next spring tide. Twelve tugboats were required to assist in freeing her. Two dredgers had helped cut away at the sandbank, near the grounding.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSCL_Indian_Ocean

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