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Comment by foxes | Hacker News Reader

What a surprise it didn’t need nuclear ordinance or building giant elaborate dams or millions of helicopters.

It's been blocked before but for a lot longer (from late 1956 to early 1957—about five months) during the Suez Crisis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis

That was a really big deal—more so than this one, I still remember the daily radio news reports and huge newspaper headlines from when I was a young kid. It was an international crisis that dragged on for months and months.

It was closed for 8 years after the 6 day war.

Yeah, right. I recall that too, it got to the point where shipping had gotten used to taking the long way around. Towards the end, everyone had become so used to the fact (and the delays) that we'd almost forgotten the canal existed.

Maybe there's now some virtue in dusting off the old proposal for second canal route via Israeli territory (of course, sans the nukes this time).

The canal was closed between 1967 and 1975, and some ships had bad timing:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_Fleet

The "crisis" was actually a war in which the UK, France, and Israel invaded Egypt:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Canal#Suez_Crisis

"To save the British from what he thought was a disastrous action and to stop the war from a possible escalation, Canadian Secretary of State for External Affairs Lester B. Pearson proposed the creation of the first United Nations peacekeeping force to ensure access to the canal for all and an Israeli withdrawal from the Sinai Peninsula. On 4 November 1956, a majority at the United Nations voted for Pearson's peacekeeping resolution, which mandated the UN peacekeepers to stay in Sinai unless both Egypt and Israel agreed to their withdrawal. The United States backed this proposal by putting pressure on the British government through the selling of sterling, which would cause it to depreciate. Britain then called a ceasefire, and later agreed to withdraw its troops by the end of the year. Pearson was later awarded the Nobel Peace Prize."

Timeghost has a great series on this:

https://youtu.be/3tnxiJ9n1c8

I think this incident really highlights how easily the Suez can be blocked.

A well hidden explosive charge on a container ship in the canal could cause a multi-month blockage - perhaps longer.

It would probably be smart to dig a 2nd channel.

Then the terrorists would need two bombs! But I think they will extend the 2nd channel - some is done already.

There is a second channel for most of its length already. I'm sure the plans to finish the work have gotten a higher priority in the past week.

We wanted the hero to be a Death Star, but in the end it was just the moon.

I don't see the problem in guessing what approaches would have been possible in which situation and wondering about it. Learning something new about a topic you wouldn't encounter elsewhere in discussion. Because after all, isn't that why we are here in the first place?

That aside, the idea of raising the water was valid and was ( luckily) available though nature. It wasn't mentioned before it appeared here. See: High tides.

And cofferdams could have been used when the situation was much worse. But the logistics of organizing it would have been painful ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26587692 )

Which is what followed when bringing up: "temporal dams" surrounding the ship. Which is obviously very different than "building giant elaborate dams".

But ofc, not everyone actually reads the things that are said and some just interpret their own prejudice. Degrading the whole discussion.

After all the crazy engineering ideas they used a load of tugboats when the tide was good? Not as sexy as a nuclear warhead though, eh.

I feel like there's something to be learnt about computer engineering. We naturally go towards ego-massaging solutions.

Pretty disappointing, honestly.

This comment really made me chuckle. I did enjoy reading the suggestions on the other thread, but not many were entirely... practical (edit for spelling)

Just to be clear: The ship is still there and still stuck. They were just able to straighten it enough (parallel to the shore) to be out of the way and no longer blocking boat traffic.

Edit: I think I saw an earlier article, other reports are now saying it's fully floating and moving.

Are you sure? It seems to be moving out of the channel now: https://www.vesselfinder.com/?imo=9811000

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