Egypt’s Suez Canal chief on Saturday noted that “technical or human errors” could be behind the grounding of the huge container ship blocking the vital waterway, causing a backlog of over 300 vessels.
Osama Rabie, head of the Suez Canal Authority, told reporters in Suez that the ship could possibly be afloat again by Sunday night.
This incident has crippled global supply chains, forcing companies to consider the expensive option of re-routing vessels around the southern tip of Africa.
Rabie said strong winds and weather factors were not the main reasons for the ship’s grounding — there may have been technical or human errors involved too.
When asked when the vessel might be freed, he said : it is depending on the ship’s responsiveness” to tides.
He disclosed that Billions of dollars-worth of cargo are now stalled at either end of the vital shipping lane linking Asia and Europe.
That has forced cargo firms to decide whether to wait it out or take the longer, more expensive route around the Cape of Good Hope — at the cost of up to 12 additional days at sea.
He also stated that Egypt is losing some $12-14 million in revenue from the canal for each day it is closed.
