Panama Canal Faces Tough Times As Ship Crossings Dip

• The Panama Canal, an engineering wonder allowing ships to travel between two oceans, is seeking to adapt to climate change after a biting drought has seen traffic and income dry up.
• The canal relies on rainwater to move ships through a series of locks that function like water elevators, raising the vessels up and over the continent between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. However, a water shortage due to low rainfall has forced operators to restrict the number of vessels passing through
• When it operates at full capacity, about 36 to 38 ships transit it daily. However, the canal authority says this will likely drop to between 30 and 32 ships as it continues to roll out water efficiency measures.
• As a result, it expects the waterway’s revenue to shrink by about €182 million (US$231Mn) in the next fiscal year, which starts in October, canal administrator Ricaurte Vasquez said Thursday, August 3.
• Additionally, there are fears that conditions may deteriorate further. As the region experiences an extended dry season, authorities say the start of the El Niño weather phenomenon could worsen conditions as the normal patterns of tropical precipitation and atmospheric circulation are disrupted, hence triggering extreme climate events around the globe including droughts in some areas and floods in others.

(Source: Euro News)