2023-08-23 04:31:37
The Suez Canal Authority announced, on Wednesday, “the floating of a ship loaded with natural gas, following it ran aground in the navigational passage of the canal,” according to Archyde.com.
The agency had quoted two shipping sources in Egypt as saying that “the navigation traffic is flowing normally through the Suez Canal, following the separation of two tankers that collided earlier.”
And the “Marine Traffic” company, which tracks the movement of ships, quoting witnesses, reported early Wednesday that the liquefied natural gas tanker “BW Lesmis”, flying the flag of Singapore, and the oil products tanker “Buri”, flying the flag of the Cayman Islands, collided for a short time. on the Egyptian channel.
The two sources gave no other details regarding the incident.
However, the Cairo news channel, in a post on the X platform, formerly known as Twitter, quoted the head of the Suez Canal Authority, Osama Rabie, as saying that “a ship broke down in the canal’s navigational course and began its towing operation,” without providing further details.
Ship-tracking data on the Refinitiv Eikon indicates that by 5 am local time (2 am GMT), the BW Lesmis was facing north, while two tugboats towed it south.
At the same time, the data also showed that the tanker “Bouri” was anchored regarding 12 kilometers from the southern end of the canal, with its nose heading to the south.
And a time-lapse clip of the tracking map of the two tankers, published by “Marine Traffic”, showed the turn of the tanker Borei and the collision of its side with the tanker “BW Lesmis”, which was already parked on the width of the channel at 8:40 at night GMT, before Bouri retreated and straightened.
Neither BW Group nor TMS Tankers, which operates the Borei tanker, immediately responded to requests for comment.
A person who answered a phone call from Archyde.com to the Suez Canal Authority operations room said that he “might not provide any information regarding the two tankers,” but he did not disclose his name.
The Suez Canal is one of the busiest waterways in the world and the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia, and nearly 12 percent of world trade passes through the canal.
During high winds in 2021, the huge container ship ′′ Ever Given ′′ misdemeanored the channel, which led to a 6-day stoppage of navigation and disruption of global trade.
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