Serious damage from the blockage of the Suez Canal «kleinezeitung.at

The Suez Canal was opened On November 17, 1869, with great pomp. It is considered one of the most important waterways in the world. The number of ships sailing through the canal daily has fluctuated between 40 and 60 for decades.

With shipments greater than ever before Especially container ships, the amount of cargo they bring through the canal is increasing: while in 1975 approximately 680,000 cubic meters of cargo were transported through shipping lanes, and the figure was 2.8 million cubic meters in 1995 and about 7.8 million in 2015. cubic.

161 kilometers have been built Long canal of the French diplomat and engineer Ferdinand de Lesseps Largely according to the plans of Austrian Alois NegrelliOne of the most important technicians of his time.

Nagreli died on October 1, 1858. About half a year before it begins to build a breakthrough between the Mediterranean and the Red Sea. After ten years of work, the waterway between Port Said and Suez was completed in 1869 during the reign of Khedive (Viceroy) Ismail of Egypt. Nicolaus Alois Maria Vincenz von Negrelli was born on January 23, 1799 in Fiera di Primiero (in today’s Trentino). Among other things, he built the first Swiss railway line (Zurich-Baden-Basel), From 1840 a part of the Northern Railway in Austria and also participated in the construction of the Vienna-Salzburg West Railway, as well as in the railway projects in Württemberg and Saxony.

Over the years He participates extensively in the Suez Canal project. In 1846 Negrelli sent two engineers to the Suez region to make the first measurements. In 1857, he was appointed General Inspector of all Egyptian Canal construction by the Egyptian Khedive Said Pasha. In 1858 Negrelli succumbed suddenly to a kidney ailment. Lesseps obtained the concession to build the Suez Canal, which began on April 25, 1859. He obtained the documents for this matter from Negreli’s widow from his property for a relatively small sum of 20,000 guilders.

That’s tens of thousands Egyptian slave laborers were forced to toil under harsh conditions and thousands were killed in construction, and is rarely mentioned today. The achievement was a dark chapter for British imperialism. Egypt was heavily indebted for construction and other projects, including as a result of exorbitant loan rates, and fell financially dependent on the Europeans. In 1875 the country went bankrupt. The United Kingdom, whose banks now control a large portion of Egyptian state revenues, has expanded its influence in the Middle East and secured an important maritime trade route to India. The aversion to the British, who declared Egypt a protectorate in 1914, is still felt today.

The real party begins Not until 1956 for Egypt, when the canal was nationalized, making it one of the country’s most important sources of foreign currency. With multiple extensions – most recently a two-lane expansion over additional divisions – the channel should remain attractive to freight trucks and container giants, partly due to short waiting times. In August, the Canal Authority announced a record annual sales of $ 5.9 billion (€ 5.4 billion), and in February 2019 it recorded its highest daily load in 150 years.