A giant MSC containership is aground at the southern end of the Suez Canal and blocking the other ship to pass through the busy waterway of Suez Canal.
circulating photo online
The vessel is the Portuguese-flagged MSC Fabiola, a 12,500 teu, 366-meter-long containership chartered by Mediterranean Shipping Company and operated by the German company Peter Döhle Schiffahrts-KG.
The shipping agency GAC reports that the vesssl aground about 16:30 local time on Thursday (April 28) after the ship experienced engine trouble.
MSC Fabiola was 10 in a southbound convoy of 20 vessels. The rest of the convoy, consisting of 8 other vessels, have been stopped. Northbound convoys scheduled for Friday have been suspended, while Friday’s southbound convoys started at 0800 hours local time, but will be forced to stop and wait at Great Bitter Lakes, GAC said.
“Suez Canal tugs are trying to assist the ship, but more traffic delays are expected until the grounded vessel is floated,” GAC said in a statement.
Update: April 30. The MSC Fabiola was refloated early Saturday morning with assistance of tugs and was able to resume its southbound transit.
