panama canal

[Barry Donovan]

a new lock is in place bigger than ever.

the path is so large transportation costs drop across the planet.. just letting more and bigger ships through.

I am still trying to find an opening day video in english (today)
still setting up for monday official.

I did fidget with close captioning.. spanish to english.
7 people died making this channel versus 28000.

they dug less than the original..only 25% less.
they poured 1.1 million more cubic feet of concrete than the original.

the new lock is 180 feet wide...and gained 300 feet length.(50%+)

in the documentary you'll see containers with a recessed engine looking thing at the front. those are called reefers (refigerated) , those engines run to keep the containers cool for food.
the quicker we all get them, the better.

This is quite historic.

[silver_bullet]

appreciate the heads-up! being one who has transited the ditch, it is an awesome thought that it could be made even larger!

[Barry Donovan]

appreciate the heads-up! being one who has transited the ditch, it is an awesome thought that it could be made even larger!

it must be incredible, especially those close to it, witnessing the many years.
my uncle had a story on the canal, (he was a marijuane guru)
they are strict enough to never let illegal anything get through, unless deep mob tactics have their way with containers.
more jobs for a lot of people.

[silver_bullet]

The USS Iowa is 108 feet of beam (wide) the Canal original width through the locks was 110 feet... the Bosuns Mates that had to repaint the scrapes on the hull were not pleased!

[pdub]

That's neat stuff Barry, thanks for the post!

[Barry Donovan]

The USS Iowa is 108 feet of beam (wide) the Canal original width through the locks was 110 feet... the Bosuns Mates that had to repaint the scrapes on the hull were not pleased!

I was a boy in new jersey with my dad at the docks, he is a trucker.
All over the place actually, anywhere with containers.

One of my first questions on one of our first trips..

"why is that ship scraped up.. unlucky if to get hit by that."

panama canal...or one of the canals. maybe suez or someplace.

the volume if to have never seen a full ship... astounding.
they only got even bigger.


"post panama" is the new big ship standard.
for a century it was "panama" as the big ship standard.

We had to wait nearby once, less than a couple hundred feet. Very tired..
no sleep with the container boat engine idling. The engine could be felt on the dock.

A giant empty 55 gallon drum type sound.
That may be the root of my extra terrestrial standards for engine building.

[pdub]

The only ship I've ever been on was a Big Red Boat, a Disney thing. A Blues Cruise, there were some big music names on board. We went out toward the islands in the Blizzard of '96. That was a huge storm, all of the eastern seaboard, and all the way south of Florida.

It's politically incorrect to say so, but there was a Native American on board. Alaska, he got the award for coming the farthest to the port to get on the ship. He couldn't handle alcohol. He had like two liquor drinks the first day on board and was completely impaired the whole rest of the week. That's all he had, according to him, two alcohol drinks on that first day.

The ship would lean to the left, there he goes, staggering, running, catching himself with his feet in front of the band stage. The ship would then roll back to the right, there he comes back again, across the room, nearly falling down at ten miles per hour. It was sort of funny but it wasn't.

[Aircooled]

Panama's ability to get this project done in time has been a big source of concern for a lot of people in the US LNG industry. There are over $40 billion worth of LNG export projects currently under construction on the Gulf Coast. All of them depend upon the new Panama locks to enable them ship LNG to Asia and pay their investors back.

[STINEY]

Super cool! Thanks Barry.

Had been kinda following this, didn't realize it had opened..

The big canal history and building is fascinating. Basically the whole thing has a level that is above sea level, iirc. Wild scale of largeness!

[Loren]

A favorite from the used-book store in the town we vacation near has been this, from 1915. I think I paid $45 for it, huge bargain for a thick, heavy book, was very interesting to see the contemporary account in words and photos. Man, what a job. Steamshovels, rail tracks and equipment, and sweat. When you see old excavation machinery imagine what it was they were able to do with it a hundred-plus years ago, and yes sometimes get themselves killed at it.

[Barry Donovan]

the History of suez has Lagasse the french guy who also died before finishing the panama.
and port sayid is named after another near selfless rich guy, they all worked together.

America thunk much bigger but in a suicidal viet nam war kinda way for panama..
as if people were n a do or die military mission. the spanish do not like that, neither did the Suez countries.
I like seeing how happy spanish get over this stuff.


Watching their own news closed captioning is working.
I found 33 increased to 50 meter, and length is 427 meter (almost half a kilometer).
draft is 18 from 15, leaving 3 meters of room (about 10 feet).

they also welcomed more small boats as time intervals will drop, and sometimes they can fit a bunch on one lock that is open.

an interesting tidbit..
if a boat has to use suez and panama, they shave off 75% of the time.
a lock fee of 600k euros for the biggest still saved them millions.

I am thinking of more foods in a timely manner, america exporting, and costs to the end customers. it all goes together...

the mystery, also with suez..they thought they needed 30 foot rise and fall.
the panama could be dug in a big way to no locks at all as well...
the tide on the pacific side is 22 feet.

that was the story my uncle told, after his insane colombia venture.

[Deaf Bob]

Watched a PBS special on the canal's building...
Started and stopped then disease took over, yep, you could die!
Amazing was they built rail lines ll over to move dirt.. Trucks were too small!

[oletrux4evr]

Watched a PBS special on the canal's building...
Started and stopped then disease took over, yep, you could die!
Amazing was they built rail lines ll over to move dirt.. Trucks were too small!

They used flat cars, and designed stationary 'sweeps' to clean the dirt off as the cars rolled by. Other novel methods of getting the massive amount of work done. A great model of efficiency.
This new lock was under construction when we went through the canal about 3 years ago. While it is a giant step forward, the canal can only handle ships that will fit in the smallest lock.....they have a ways to go in that regard if their intent is to make the Panama Canal a 'plus' size for future vessels.

[Aircooled]

The visual answer to "How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time"

[SuperBuickGuy]

I saw a show on Discovery about this - what's interesting is they had to do water-conservation techniques because if they did not, Gatun Lake would completely drain. For those who don't know, Gatun Lake is what powers the canal - it was created to store water and provide a transit path for the ships. If someone pulled the plug on Gatun Lake, the Canal would cease to exist.