The Suez Canal is a canal in Egypt, opened in 1869, it allows water transportation between Europe and Asia without the need of circumnavigating around Africa or carrying goods overland between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea. The northern terminus is Port Said.
The canal is 192 km long. It is single lane with 4 passing places north and south of the Great Bitter Lake, and links the Mediterranean Sea to the Gulf of Suez on the Red Sea.
The canal is owned and maintained by the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) of the Arab Republic of Egypt. The canal has no locks due to the flat terrain, and the minor sea level difference between each end is inconsequential.
There is one shipping lane with several passing areas. On a typical day, three convoys transit the canal, two southbound and one northbound. The first southbound convoy enters the canal in the early morning hours and proceeds to the Great Bitter Lake, where the ships anchor out of the fairway, awaiting passage of the northbound convoy. The northbound convoy passes the second southbound convoy, which moors in a bypass near El Qantara. The passage takes between 11 and 16 hours at a speed of around 8 knots (15 km/h). The low speed helps prevent erosion of the canal banks by ships' wakes.
The opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 created the first salt-water passage between the Mediterranean and Red seas. The Red Sea is about 1.2 m higher than the eastern Mediterranean, so the canal serves as a tidal strait that pours Red Sea water into the Mediterranean. The Bitter Lakes, which are hypersaline natural lakes that form part of the canal, blocked the migration of Red Sea species into the Mediterranean for many decades, but as the salinity of the lakes gradually equalised with that of the Red Sea, the barrier to migration was removed, and plants and animals from the Red Sea have begun to colonise the eastern Mediterranean.
wow!!! I did not know dear Jen !!! very interesting!!!!! nice capture by you!!!!! no more warm weather, heavy clouds and winds here :( have a nice Sunday, hugs Marian
Thanks so much dear Gust@vo, it was a different experience to pass underneath the Suez Canal...:) Muchos gracias and wishing you a lovely weekend! Hugs Jen
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