If you’re someone who’s wondering what’s up with the Suez Canal being blocked by Ever Given and find yourself scratching your head reading heaps of information about it, worry not. Today we will explain you what’s going on with one of the biggest trading routes, what will be the implications of Suez Canal’s blockage, and what kind of efforts are being made to manage the crisis.

Why is Suez Canal so important?

The Suez Canal is one of the most important trading routes in the world, connecting the Mediterranean and Red Sea through Egypt. To understand the importance of the canal, one must note that the waterway carries around 12% of the world’s trade by allowing ships to transport shipments. The canal is a shortcut for ships that want to transport their shipments between Europe and Asia. Before 1869, when the canal was built, the ships used to sail around Africa to complete the journey which used to add up weeks in their journey.

How was Suez Canal blocked?

On Tuesday, a Panama-based container ship called Ever Given got stuck in the Suez Canal by bad weather. The ship is 400-meter long and 59-meter wide, as long as the Empire State Building in New York City. While passing through the Suez Canal to enter the Mediterranean Sea from the Red Seas, Ever Given was hit by a strong gust of wind and ended up getting stuck in the canal. The satellite images showed the Ever Given impending all the traffic on the canal and blocking the ships from both the sides of the seas that are still waiting to cross the canal.

What efforts are being made to unblock the Suez Canal?

For the most part of week, several tugboats and dredgers have unsuccessfully tried to fail the skyscraper sized cargo ship. Even though the sea did its part in helping the authorities by providing high tides, the giant cargo ship is still stuck and has shown no sign of budging.

Meanwhile, the company that owns the ship called Shoei Kisen Kaisha, issued an apology saying how the company is determined to keep working on the issue and resolve it as soon as possible. ““We would like to apologize to all parties affected by this incident, including the ships travelling and planning to travel through Suez Canal,” the apology statement said.

So far, several dredgers have been called upon that could help with clearing the slit around the cargo ship. Tug boats have been trying to nudge the ship and helping it to gain momentum. A backhoe was used to dig deeper into the canal. However, all of these efforts have been unsuccessful so far.

Meanwhile, a firm from Netherlands that specializes in salvaging was called upon. After investigation, one top official of the company said that the removal of the ship could take weeks. Another team from SMIT was called to carry out investigations. After the team did its inspections, they suggested an idea involving the scraping of bottom of the canal around the Ever Given.

Meanwhile, reports suggest that over 150 ships that were waiting for Ever Given to be cleared have backed up. However, there are hundreds of these ships that are already en route to the canal.

What are the implications of Ever Given blocking the Suez Canal?

According to an analysis by Refinitiv, a financial data aggregation company, over 300 cargo ships are en route to the Suez Canal in the upcoming two weeks. Although some of these smaller vessels may change their course, the disruption caused by Suez Canal being blocked amounts to goods of more than $9 billion dollars’ worth being wasted. Even Lloyd’s List, a sipping journal, estimates that goods worth $9.6 billion pass through the canal each day. While $5.1 billion of that goes to the West, $4.5 billion goes to East.

The canal also helps the cargo ships carry 1.9 million barrels of oil to go from one end of the world to the other. The blocking may impact the supply of oil and natural gas from East to Europe.

Memes flow as tragedy strikes, Best Suez Canal-Ever Given memes

While the authorities around the world are trying to find a solution to the problem, the netizens in their own way acknowledged the situation. Here we have the best memes found on Twitter.