Workers have successfully set free a colossal container ship that for nearly a week has been stuck sideways across the Suez Canal, a canal service provider has said.
Leth Agencies said that the vessel had been refloated on Monday.
Helped by the peak of high tide, a flotilla of tugboats managed to wrench the bow of the skyscraper-sized Ever Given from the sandy back of the crucial waterway, where it had been firmly lodged since last Tuesday.
Tugboats were pulling the vessel toward the Great Bitter Lake, in the middle of the waterway, where it will undergo inspections.
A Reuters witness saw the ship moving and a shipping tracker and Egyptian TV showed it positioned in the centre of the canal.
The 400-metre (430-yard) long Ever Given got wedged diagonally across the canal in high winds early last Tuesday, blocking the path for hundreds of vessels waiting to transit the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.
Shipping rates for oil product tankers nearly doubled after the ship became stranded.
It was feared that the giant vessel may have taken weeks and be complicated by unstable weather, threatening costly delays for companies already dealing with Covid-19 restrictions.
All its 25 crew members, who have remained on board, were safe, in good health and spirits, Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement (BSM), the Ever Given's technical manager said.
At least 369 vessels were waiting to transit the canal, including dozens of container ships, bulk carriers, oil tankers and liquefied natural gas (LNG) or liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) vessels, SCA Chairman Osama Rabie told Egypt's Extra News on Sunday.
Had the vessel remained stuck shippers may have decided to reroute around the Cape of Good Hope, adding about two weeks to journeys and extra fuel costs.
That would have taken hundreds of tonnes more fuel while significantly delaying the transportation of goods.
Three shipping agents said on Saturday that none of the ships waiting at the canal's entrances had yet requested to be rerouted.
About 15% of world shipping traffic transits the Suez Canal, which is a key source of foreign currency revenue for Egypt.
Had efforts to get the ship free of the mud this week proved unsuccessful, then some of its 600 containers would have had to be removed from it.
This process would have taken weeks to complete.
As well as disrupting shipping and costing money, the delay claimed the lives of dozen of sheep being held in the Ever Given and other boat's cargo holds.
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