A year after the blocking of the Suez Canal by the “Ever Given”, the “Ever Forward” is blocked on the east coast of the United States, in the Chesapeake Bay, near the Craighill Canal.
This other container ship operated by the Taiwanese company Evergreen, which flies the Hong Kong flag, had just left Baltimore port. He was heading for Norfolk, where he was expected on March 17.
Salvage operations of the vessel by a team from the Maryland State Coast Guard are continuing. No injuries, no pollution and no damage to the hull of the container ship are to be deplored.
The “Ever Forward”, which is 334 meters long and has a capacity of 11,850 TEUs, does not block the Craighill Channel. Port authorities in Baltimore have only recommended other ships change their route before its refloating is complete.
The causes of the incident remain unknown. The container ship is not old. It was built in 2020. Its planned stopover in Norfolk has been postponed.
One year after the “Ever Given” accident
It was a sandstorm that blocked the “Ever Given” in March 2021 in the Suez Canal. The container ship, which flies the Panamanian flag, is nearly 400 meters long and has a capacity of more than 20,000 TEUs.
It ran aground on March 23, blocking transit on the canal. The clearing operations, which lasted six days, required the intervention of more than ten tugs as well as dredges to dig the bottom of the canal.
A total of 422 ships, loaded with 26 million tons of goods, had been blocked for almost a week. The grounding in the Suez Canal of the container ship had caused the delay in the delivery of goods and disrupted operations in some western ports. After its release, the number of stopovers in Northern Europe had increased.
The accident had put the spotlight on the world’s seventh largest maritime carrier in 2021. The Taiwanese, at one time one of the leaders in the container sector, currently deploys a capacity of 1.5 million TEUs. It operates a fleet of 202 vessels, including 122 owned and 80 chartered.
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