Panama Canal is one of biggest, largest and historical manmade engineering achievement in the world. Panama is manmade artificial canal, which is 82 km long and 85ft deep (at the highest level) and connect two biggest oceans in the world Atlantic and Pacific. It cuts across the Isthmus of Panama. It’s also includes an artificial lake & Gatun lake to reduces time and excavation work easy and quick. After USA delivered authorities to panama government in 1999. The Panama Canal expansion project started in 2007 for high ocean traffic needs.
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Panama Canal Expansion Project
The Panama expansion project as known as Third set of Locks started on September 2007 and ended 26 June 2016. Panama Canal locks got doubled Canal’s capacity on March 2nd 2018. Project cost was $5.2 billion with 30,000 workers. The project aim was doubling the capacity of the Panama Canal by increasing the amount of ships by adding new lane and increasing limited size of ships by increasing the maximum allowed width , depth and height having a internationally impact on economies of scale and international maritime trade. The old locks used to allow the passage of vessels that can carry up to 5,000 containers. After the expansion the canal locks, Panamas vessels are now able to transit through the Canal, with up to 13,000/14,000 container ships. Present time locks allow ships to be raised from the level of the oceans to the Gatun Lake and vice versa. Average crossing time now is less than two hours.
History of Panama Canal
The idea of the 20s century biggest manmade project ‘’Panama” Canal came back to 1513, when Vasco Nunez de balboa first crossed the Isthmus of Panama which was part of Colombia. Then 300 years later failure of the French construction team in the 1880s, the United States America started building a canal across a 50-mile stretch of the isthmus in 1904. The project was helped by the Jamaican and Indian worker. The chief engineer John Stevens came up with innovative techniques and spurred the crucial redesign from a sea-level to a lock manmade canal. His successor George Washington Goethals stepped up excavation efforts of a stubborn mountain area of Isthmus panama and created the building of the dams and locks. Historical Panama Canal opened in 1914. After about 80 years later the world-famous Panama Canal was transferred from the U.S. to Panama government in 1999.
How long is Panama Canal?
The historical Panama Canal is about 82 km long and about 85ft deep at deepest level. Three chambers which make up each lock is 55 mi wide, 427 mi long and 23-33 mi deep, and they are also equipped with horizontally sliding sluice systems which can overcome the difference in level of approximately 27 mi between the oceans and Gatun Lake. After the expansion project the canal locks, Panamas vessels are now able to transit through the Canal, with up to 13,000/14,000 container ships.