Photo: Suez Canal Authority via Agence France-Presse. On Monday morning at dawn, the 400-meter-long, over 220,000-ton vessel, flying the Panamanian flag, had started to move.
Normal transits in the Suez Canal are resuming for more than 400 waiting ships after Evergreen Line confirmed that Ever Given was successfully refloated within the SuezCanal at approximately 15:04 March 29 local time. In order for the Canal to resume normal operation, the vessel is leaving the grounding site with assistance of tugboats. The chartered vessel will be repositioned to the Great BitterLake in the Canal for an inspection of its seaworthiness.
The outcome of that inspection will determine whether the ship can resume its scheduled service. Once the inspection is finalized, decisions will be made regarding arrangements for cargo currently on board.
“We are most grateful to the Suez Canal Authority and all the concerned parties for their assistance and support through this difficult and unfortunate situation, “ Evergreen Line said. “We would also like to express our deepest appreciation to the crew who remain steadfast in their posts as well as the salvage experts and dredging team for their professionalism and relentless efforts over the past 6 days toward securing this outcome.”
Evergreen will coordinate with the shipowner to deal with subsequent matters after the shipowner and other concerned parties complete investigation reports into the incident.
Ever Given is a 20,000 TEU-class container ship, currently leased by Evergreen Marine Corp. under a time charter agreement. The ship is deployed on a Far East-Europe service route.
