Free Republic

With the costs of the closure of one of the world’s most vital maritime arteries growing by the day, salvage teams hoped on Sunday to take advantage of the full moon and swelling tides to dislodge the giant cargo ship stuck in the Suez Canal. Late Saturday, tugboat drivers sounded their horns in celebration of the most visible sign of progress since the ship ran aground late Tuesday: The 220,000-ton Ever Given had moved. Granted, it did not go far — just two degrees, or about 100 feet, according to shipping officials. But that came on top of progress in...

The number of vessels stuck in a traffic jam outside the Suez Canal rose to 200 Friday as recent efforts to free a cargo ship wedged between the Canal’s two banks failed. Dislodging the stuck ship, the Ever Given, could take up to a week, and the vessel can encounter structural issues while it remains stuck, a salvage expert told the Associated Press (AP). The Suez Canal handles approximately 12% of international trade. Its recent blockage threatens to harm the world economy and poses a disruption to global supply chains, CNBC reported.... The ensuing traffic jams forced several cargo ships...

From the heights of Gibraltar you can see Africa about nine miles to the south and gaze eastward on the seemingly endless Mediterranean that stretches 1,500 miles to Asia beyond. The Romans called it Mare Nostrum, "our sea," and these deep blue waters allowed Rome to unite Asia, Africa, and Europe for half a millennium under a single prosperous, globalized civilization. But the Mediterranean has not always proved to be history's incubator of great civilizations -- Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Ottoman, Florentine, and Venetian. Sometimes the ancient "Pillars of Hercules" at Gibraltar's narrow mouth of the Mediterranean marked not so much...

"Sir, you have done India proud." That was how the anchorman of a television channel in Delhi addressed the Indian navy chief, Admiral Sureesh Mehta, on the victorious sea battle by warship INS Tabar with would-be hijackers as dusk was falling on Tuesday evening in the Gulf of Aden. Those words would have made Sir Francis Drake, the 16th-century British navigator and slaver-politician of the Elizabethan era, truly envious. Sir Francis had bigger claims to fame in a life cut short by dysentery while attacking San Juan, Puerto Rico, in 1595. Unsurprisingly, the patriotic Indian media dutifully expressed its gratitude...