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Businesses

The Ever Given is Once Again Afloat, Raising Hopes Traffic Can Soon Resume. (nytimes.com) 178

The mammoth cargo ship blocking one of the world's most vital maritime arteries was wrenched from the shoreline and set partially afloat again early on Monday morning, raising hopes that traffic could soon resume in the Suez Canal and limit the economic fallout of the disruption. From a report: Salvage teams, working on both land and water for five days and nights, were ultimately assisted by forces more powerful than any of the machines rushed to the scene to assist in the rescue: the moon the tides. As water levels swelled overnight, the hours spent digging and excavating millions of tons of earth around the Ever Green paid dividends as the ship slowly regained buoyancy, according to officials. Images on social media showed tugboat crews celebrating the victory in the predawn hours.

It appeared to be the culmination of one of the largest and most intense salvage operations in modern history, with the smooth functioning of the entire global trading system hanging in the balance. Each day the canal was blocked put global supply chains another day closer to a full-blown crisis. Vessels packed with the world's goods -- including cars, oil, livestock and laptops -- usually flow through the waterway with ease, supplying much of the globe as they traverse the quickest path from Asia and the Middle East to Europe and the East Coast of the United States. With concerns the salvage operation could take weeks, some ships decided not to wait, U-turning to take the long way around the southern tip of Africa, a voyage that could add weeks to the journey and cost more than $26,000 a day in fuel costs.
Traffic is beginning to resume.
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The Ever Given is Once Again Afloat, Raising Hopes Traffic Can Soon Resume.

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  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 29, 2021 @01:18AM (#61211224)
    We've just demonstrated to them a great way to do some real damage to the world economy and score some easy Allah points.
    • Yes because stranding a large cargo ship in a canal is an easy to both pull off and permanently disables that canal. Or blow up a canal's locks with explosives. . .nah that's too simple; they would not get any style points.
      • by myth24601 ( 893486 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @09:05AM (#61212414)

        This particular canal has no locks and locks in other canals might be better protected. It has some very long choke points and it's proximity in the middle east might make it more attractive to terrorists in that region. Terrorist tend to like mass casualties that draw a lot of media coverage but, in this case, the media coverage might make such an attack more appealing to them.

        • So you think that hijacking a cargo ship Is way easier and more permanent that using explosives?
          • by chmod a+x mojo ( 965286 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @09:30AM (#61212510)

            Why bother to hijack? Improvised mines would be hard to detect for non military ships, and could sink a huge container ship right in the middle of the channel so no other ships can get around it. Cleanup of THAT mess would be months to potentially years.

            Not really any different than IED's on the roadside. Or a car bomb.

            • The canal is heavily patrolled by various militaries. I doubt the mine idea would work reliably.

              • by Salgak1 ( 20136 )

                Are they patrolling underwater ? A submersible or crawling drone would not be visible from the surface, especially if camouflaged. Shaped charges aren't that hard to make.

                For that matter, SCUBA-equipped terrorists could place radio-controlled limpet-style mines on hulls of ships lined up to traverse the canal. . .

                And "various' militaries ?? The canal is entirely inside Egyptian territory. . . .

          • It probably is, because they don't have very good security. In general they are prohibited from carrying weapons. Major locks, on the other hand, often have guards. If you want major boom boom though you could hijack a ship and then blow it up in the locks.

            • It sure seems like planting a big enough bomb in the engine room could possibly do the trick, at least in terms of disabling the ship's navigation and propulsion. It still might not get stuck, though.

              I suspect holing the hull is a lot harder without much more serious application of explosives (shaped charges, applied with some knowledge of modern hull construction) or just much more explosives, like a container at the bottom of the stack filled with thousands of pounds of explosives. The challenge there i

          • by Geoffrey.landis ( 926948 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @09:52AM (#61212600) Homepage

            So you think that hijacking a cargo ship Is way easier and more permanent that using explosives?

            Apparently a motorboat full of Somali pirates successfully hijack cargo ships, so, yes.

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

        • Yeah, I can't imagine what would happen if someone tried to blow up a 200' wide hole in the ground.

          This whole thread is just stupid. The entire reason this took so long was that they didn't want to break the ship. If someone sinks a couple of ships in the canal, they'll just blow them up and drag the parts out of the way.

          Plus, there aren't many single ships large enough to block it. This just happened to be one of the few that could.

    • by Luckyo ( 1726890 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @09:45AM (#61212562)

      That was demonstrated in 1956 crisis, when Egypt intentionally sunk 40 ships in the channel. They were refloated and removed in 1957.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Why would they attack the world economy though? In fact economic attacks in general don't seem to be of much interest to them, understandably given their goals.

    • As a bonus, they don't even need to kill or even injure anyone, which would gain them sympathy points and more people would be inclined to at least listen to their demands.

      "Sure they caused a lot of monetary damages, but at least nobody got hurt! They can't be that bad!"

      • Not sure if you are aware of ISIS theology but killing the infidel is largely the point. They are not looking for sympathy.

        The ISIS manual includes sections on mutilation of corpses, the trade in human organs, beheading, the killing of children along with “scorched earth operations”.

      • "Sure they caused a lot of monetary damages, but at least nobody got hurt! They can't be that bad!"

        "What about that tattoo on your chest? Doesn't it say die Bart die?

        "No, that's German for Thee Bart, Thee."

        "No one who speaks German could be an evil man."
    • by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      Are you feeling terror because of the Ever Given?

      Terrorism is achieving (or attempting to achieve) political goals through causing fear.

      Blocking a canal can be a great form of economic warfare, but it's crappy terrorism. Blocking this canal is generally crappy economic warfare too, because pretty much everybody depends on it. It might be a reasonable strategy for North Korea I guess.

    • I'm sure the Middle East would just love to clog up trade of oil exports. They're not loving this either.

    • There's a reason wars have been fought for the Suez.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
  • floats all boats.
  • Why NYT (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Sivaraj ( 34067 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @01:41AM (#61211260)

    Why are the links frequently point to paywalled NYT for such popular story covered by all major media? I can understand exclusive stories. But should common stories try to link to openly accessible media rather than paywalled ones?

    • What's the big deal? Delete their cookie; read the article.

      --
      • What? How are you supposed to read an article behind a paywall? Does block element tricks work?

        • 1) open Tor browser.

          2) Navigate to link.

          3) Read article.
        • What? How are you supposed to read an article behind a paywall? Does block element tricks work?

          NYTimes gives you a certain number of free articles. Once you run out, delete the cookies, and you get more free articles.

      • Or go to other free sites like Reuters. NYT was probably one of first but this is a big story easy to find elsewhere . Agree extra work to circumvent the link in SD post. Should avoid paywalls if possible.
        • A little further down in the article and on the optimism meter:

          However, others involved in the operation urged caution.

          While the ship was moving, what remained unclear was whether the bulbous bow — a protrusion at the front of the ship just below the waterline — is totally clear of dirt and debris. If it is still stuck in clay or obstructed by rocks, the early morning optimism could quickly fade.

          Peter Berdowski, the chief executive of Royal Boskalis Westminster, which has been appointed by Ever Given’s owner to help move the vessel, told the Dutch public broadcaster NOS on Monday that he understood the bow to be stuck “rock solid.”

          “The ship is like a giant whale that we have to slide off the beach, back in the water,” he said early Monday. Pulling the stern lose, he said, was the easy part.

          • “The ship is like a giant whale that we have to slide off the beach, back in the water,” he said early Monday. Pulling the stern lose, he said, was the easy part.

            Wait, it’s like a beached whale? So does this mean we can pack it with explosives to free up the canal immediately? I mean, there are probably enough sea gulls to eat up all the pieces and leave the canal clean right?

          • The bow cannot literally be stuck "rock solid" if the rest of the ship moved, because it's all one piece. It's not like it's jointed right behind the part of the bow that's stuck.

            That doesn't mean the rest will be trivial, but it does mean that claim of how fast the bow is stuck is hyperbolic.

      • What's the big deal? Delete their cookie; read the article.

        We shouldn't be doing anything that drives traffic towards news sites that have paywalls when there are free options available.

        • We shouldn't be doing anything that drives traffic towards news sites that have paywalls when there are free options available.

          The NYTimes is free. All you have to do is delete their cookies.

          Americans will whine about anything and everything if they have to take the barest action. Such as wearing a mask for a minutes when they go shopping to prevent the spread of dangerous virus.
    • Re:Why NYT (Score:5, Informative)

      by bn-7bc ( 909819 ) <bjarne-disc@holmedal.net> on Monday March 29, 2021 @03:23AM (#61211418) Homepage
      altrernative non paywelled article https://www.bbc.com/news/world... [bbc.com]
    • Use "Private Window" or "Incognito Window" or "InPrivate Window" - it should be available on most current browsers.

    • Because quality journalism costs money. If you want to read about this on some Insta-face-twat feed, go ahead. I prefer to send some money to the Times (and a select few other news organizations) so they can keep doing editor-reviewed quality journalism.

      Anyway, the NYT *does* offer some stories for free, which are in the public interest. I believe all directly COVID-related stories were exempt from the paywall.

    • Browse using your favorite browser's anonymized method "private tab" or whatever.

      Voila, no paywall.

      • by PPH ( 736903 )

        Voila, no paywall.

        An IP block instead. I did something like that with a Washington Post article. The web site informed me that I had reached my quota of free stories and needed to subscribe. I switched to anonymous mode and was promptly informed that "something funny" appeared to be going on and my IP would be blocked. But it was our companies proxy server IP. And (later on) a chat with one of our IT people informed me that the block was company wide. And it had upset a lot of the liberal employees. I guess they didn't know

  • by Qualia ( 4941841 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @02:20AM (#61211306)
    ...that "Ever Given" will soon be renamed to "Ever Gift". I have consulted with a medium and that person assures me that on the vessel's next trip from the orient to europe she will be laden with containers full of christmas/holiday toys and will once again become wedged in the Suez Canal. Said containers will fall off the bow and, when asked to explain how that could happen yet again, the Suez pilot will state, "well, this is the Gift that keeps on Given"
    • by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

      With the plot twist that "gift" means "poison" in German.

    • ...that "Ever Given" will soon be renamed to "Ever Gift". I have consulted with a medium and that person assures me that on the vessel's next trip from the orient to europe she will be laden with containers full of christmas/holiday toys and will once again become wedged in the Suez Canal. Said containers will fall off the bow and, when asked to explain how that could happen yet again, the Suez pilot will state, "well, this is the Gift that keeps on Given"

      Turns out the Ever Given has a sister ship named the Ever Gifted [vesselfinder.com], and it's steaming from Rotterdam to Sri Lanka at 20 km/hr.

    • by burtosis ( 1124179 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @10:21AM (#61212704)

      ...that "Ever Given" will soon be renamed to "Ever Gift". I have consulted with a medium and that person assures me that on the vessel's next trip from the orient to europe she will be laden with containers full of christmas/holiday toys and will once again become wedged in the Suez Canal. Said containers will fall off the bow and, when asked to explain how that could happen yet again, the Suez pilot will state, "well, this is the Gift that keeps on Given"

      you realize this post is a felony without a certified dad card right?

  • by pele ( 151312 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @03:14AM (#61211394) Homepage

    This piece of news is so geeky..so tech..for boatspotters or something...

    • Re:Nice (Score:5, Informative)

      by hey! ( 33014 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @09:59AM (#61212624) Homepage Journal

      This single event is costing the world economy 400 million dollars per hour.

      The annual total world GDP is 87 trillion. Dividing that by 365.25 yields a world GDP of 240 billion per day, or roughly ten billion per hour. So as long as this thing is going on, it's costing the world about 4% of its total productivity.

      So there are probably some non-geeks paying serious attention to this. But getting back to geek concerns, if this continues it could cause short term coffee prices to rise.

  • by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @03:23AM (#61211416)

    Last thing we need is another toilet paper shortage.

    And why is it that the first thing that goes wrong in a crisis, regardless of the situation, is apparently a toilet paper shortage?!

  • by bobstreo ( 1320787 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @04:32AM (#61211616)

    https://istheshipstillstuck.co... [istheshipstillstuck.com]

  • A float? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Quakeulf ( 2650167 ) on Monday March 29, 2021 @06:00AM (#61211872)

    That's what you get with 32-bit precision, should have been a double.

  • "The moon the tides" should (probably) read "The moon AND the tides".
  • Prime (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 29, 2021 @09:56AM (#61212618)

    "I paid for Prime, not excuses."

  • The show is over, move along.
  • A man, a plan, a canal: Suez?

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