by Tim Rasmussen The container was loaded at Gary’s shop in Spokane on September 12, headed for Seattle to be loaded on the MSC vessel Sophia Paz. Because the dock and loading space at ports like Seattle is limited, the vessels are docked only for a few hours, so the loading is carefully scheduled and choreographed. The containers are brought to the dock and checked in (gated in) during a small window of time. If for some reason the container does not make the window of time, it must wait for the next available ship and the window of time scheduled for it to be loaded. The Sophia Paz arrived at the dock and the container was gated in on time and put aboard the vessel. The ship left the area then went out into Puget Sound and anchored. I watched the vessel at anchor for a few days via a vessel tracker website, of which there are several. I thought it was going to head into the port in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, but it did not. It just stayed at anchor for about a week, then headed down the west coast of the United States to Oakland, California. The ship was in Oakland for a day, then headed back out through the Golden Gate and on down the coast of California. I watched as the ship bypassed the port of Long Beach and was relieved because Long Beach is notorious for delays and problems with getting into the port to unload. Instead, the ship went on down the coast of Mexico, then anchored outside the port of Manzanillo. Once again, apparently waiting for a place to load and unload some containers. After a few days, the ship headed into port, was there for a few hours, then back to sea and down the coast to the ports of Panama. I had been watching and wondering if our container would be delayed in Panama because of the drought the country is experiencing. The problem was the lack of rainfall in central Panama lowered the level of Gatun Lake. Gatun Lake is a freshwater lake created by a dam which forms an important part of the Panama Canal. The lake contains the billions of gallons of water necessary to operate the locks and transport ships nearly 20 miles along their journey across Panama from one ocean to the other. The drought had caused the lake levels to drop and the Panama Canal Authority had refused to allow more than 20 vessels per day to use the locks, instead of the usual near 50. This caused the ships to pile up on both the Pacific and the Caribbean sides, waiting for the Panama Canal Authority to deem the water levels were sufficient to allow the use of the locks. There our container came to a halt. The Sophia Paz anchored and stopped. It stayed there for nearly a month, then was finally allowed to enter the canal and pass to the eastern side. Finally, on November 20, the ship arrived in Puerto Barrios and the container was unloaded and released from the customs yard on November 22. Henry and Berny were there to do the paperwork and the container was transported from the port to our shop in Poptun, Guatemala to be unloaded. It took 70 days to make the trip from Spokane to Poptun instead of 40, but there was no damage and no loss of the contents. We thank the Good Lord for his protection for our cargo that will improve the lives and health of the people in remote villages in Guatemala. If you would like to help, contact Gary Bartholomew at 509-939-1941 Tim Tim Rasmussen may be contacted via e-mail to michele@ worldwidedrillingresource.com WTR 34 FEBRUARY 2024 WorldWide Drilling Resource®
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