Egypt seizes the Ever Given, demanding $1B for Suez Canal jam | Hacker News Reader

Egypt seizes the Ever Given, demanding $1B for Suez Canal jam

washingtonpost.com

61 pointsmesofile25 comments

The story appears to be just that damages have now been set; the rest of the story is buried at the very bottom of the article:

  Investigations of how the Ever Given became lodged sideways in
  the canal are continuing. In a recent interview, Rabie suggested
  the captain could have "made a mistake" with the ship's steering
  or speed, according to Kyodo News.

  He emphasized that the two Suez Canal pilots who were on board
  to offer guidance were not ultimately responsible for making
  decisions and dismissed the idea that strong winds had pushed
  the ship off course.

  Rabie did not cite any evidence or say how he arrived at
  that conclusion.

Apparently this is just a repost of Kyodo News - https://this.kiji.is/753782748916957184?c=445918389795193953

The ship was being steered through the canal by two Suez Canal pilots. Not sure how they’re going to pin the blame on anyone but themselves.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/03/29/suez-canal-p...

The canal pilot is simply a guide. They do not have authority over the ship's captain, especially on a vessel that size.

sounds like they didn’t guide them very well, as is their job. Perhaps they could counter sue.

Now every ship has a 1B potential liability when transiting.

What a great way for Egypt to turn what was a near-disaster into a full disaster. They didn't lose out that much, everyone is playing happy families. Then they do this. Fail on so many levels. Well done Egypt in screwing over your golden goose.

Do we know what % of ships decided to go the long way around Africa? It would seem most just waited.

Egypt makes $5.6 billion per year, so assuming no ships waited, they would have lost $92 million over six days plus the money spent floating the ship.

I don't think this will change behaviour.

It's not entirely the same, but $1 bn is the minimum 3rd party insurance liability requirement for international airlines at Sydney Airport.

It's not like those ships can use a competing canal.

They can go around as many have said

>dismissed the idea that strong winds had pushed the ship off course.

>Rabie did not cite any evidence or say how he arrived at that conclusion.

Shouldn't the burden of proof be on the ship owners to show that they did everything to prevent the accident? Its like saying "He may have smashed his car into your house, but have you proved that the road was not extremely icey?" No, but the guy who smashed his car into my house should have to prove it was. I shouldnt have to prove it wasnt. He is the one responsible for his vehicle.

The complications is the presence of local mandatory pilots on the ship with your analogy, you are in the car navigating when it happened You say the driver is responsible the driver says the navigator stuffed up

When did the ship owner accuse the pilots of causing the accident? That wasn't mentioned in the article, and it doesn't change who is ultimately responsible for the ship.

I don't know how much container ships cost or how they're insured. I'm sure it's exquisitely leveraged and very complicated. ...But, is it plausible that the ship's operator just calls it a total loss and lets Egypt deal with a floating clunker in its waters, or would Egypt simply turn around and sell it?

If you order them in bulk, they’re between $115 million and $130 million each (https://gcaptain.com/ever-givens-operator-orders-20-new-ultr...).

Its cargo probably is worth a lot more, though ($130 million divided by 20,000 containers is $6,500 per container)

Egypt first would need a court to judge that its claim is valid, and then probably would sell it.

And if that doesn’t bring in the necessary amount, Egypt still would have a claim, and likely would seize any other ship from the same order that passes through the canal (possibly even ships that aren’t in Egypt)

Is the Ever Given seaworthy after its extraction?

From what I've read:

1) It was towed up the canal a short way to a "lake" area for inspection. It was leaking immediately after the grounding, and probably does have minor hull issues, but no update since it was freed.

(Steel ships rely on the forces of floating - having water push up and inward to maintain the hull shape. They're not designed to be grounded or to be allowed to sag in the middle.)

2) It was never out of Egypt's custody.

https://archive.is/pjFzY

Egypt failed to keep the canal dredged. Desert sands are blown into the canal and it's the canal authority's duty to remove the sand and keep the canal bottom clear. The Ever Given was blown out of shape in a desert dust storm and hung up on mounds of sand. If kept properly dredged, after the storm was over the ship should have been able to move back into the center of the channel on its own but failed due to accumulated sand along the sides. The fees that would have paid for sufficient canal dredging went elsewhere.

Perhaps a UN audit of where the money for proper dredging went? It's not like the UN doesn't have any say. The first time the British and French fought on the same side since the 100 years war was under the UN and Dag Hammarskjöld when Egyptian zealots felt the ships were as legitimate targets for plunder as desert caravans.

Egyptian judges are highly motivated to rule how Sisi tells them.

Assuming Ever Given's insurers get stuck for the entire billion, the ensuing premiums for Suez transit for similar sized ships might just make routing around the Cape more economic. If there's a 1/2,000 chance of getting stuck in the Suez, the insurer would need a premium of $500,000 to break even. So the ship can either spend the $500,000 on Suez premium or on fuel to go around the cape.

Which will of course deprive Egypt of the fees it charges large ships.

If there's a 1/2,000 chance of getting stuck in the Suez, the insurer would need a premium of $500,000 to break even.

Not necessarily. The Ever Given has a length of 1312 feet, beam of 193 feet, and draft of 108 feet. That ship is huge!

There's not a linear relationship between ship size and "chance of getting stuck". Slightly smaller ships would probably have a much lower premium.

> If there's a 1/2,000 chance of getting stuck in the Suez

50 Ships on average pass through the suez canal per day. In the ~20 years that ships have been large enough to potentially block it, this has happened once. That's a roughly 1/365,000 chance of getting stuck. Even if we assume the risk is actually 10 times higher, that would only be a $27,000 premium - basically a rounding error compared to the $700,000 in tolls each ship already needs to pay.

World shipping has 2 options: spend a lot of time and fuel and money going around Africa or deal with one of the more corrupt and dishonest countries and just hope for the best every time...

Actually Egypt is really middle of the round, just below average: 117/179.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corruption_Perceptions_Index

Out of ranked countries it's in the lower half. But the lower end also seems very compressed. Sitting 21 points over the lowest score of 12. But 55 below the highest score of 88.

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