For some voyaging sailors, a night at sea in gale conditions is a piece of cake next to the challenge of maneuvering a single-screw, no-bow thruster voyaging sailboat in the tight confines of a crowded harbor with a crosswind and a current running. Voyagers who are skittish about their vessel handling skills can take some solace in the fact that even the pros make mistakes — sometimes big ones. A case in point is the March 23, 2021, accident that left the 1,312-foot, 20,124-TEU container ship Ever Given, owned by Evergreen Marine and one of the world’s largest commercial vessels,…
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David Burch of Starpath Navigation examines the March 23, 2021 grounding of the 1,300-foot container ship Ever Given at 0700 local time at kilometer-marker 151 in the Suez Canal. Burch performs this reenactment with AIS data and an ENC chart of the canal using the free, donation-supported navigation and weather routing program from France called qtVlm, available at www.meltemus.com/index.php/en​. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQzomgjdtI0
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