Who pays for Suez blockage? Ever Given grounding could spark years of litigation

  • Date: 30-Mar-2021
  • Source: The Guardian
  • Sector:Economy
  • Country:Egypt
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Who pays for Suez blockage? Ever Given grounding could spark years of litigation

After hauling its 240,000-ton bulk down the Suez canal a week after blocking the essential waterway, the container ship the Ever Given is likely to become the centre of a protracted battle over who will pay for its rescue.The 1,312-ft-long ship was aground on the banks of the Suez Canal for a week, causing an estimated £7bn loss each day in trade owing to ships stuck on either side, and up to £10.9m a day for the canal. “We managed to refloat the ship in record time. If such a crisis had occurred anywhere else in the world, it would have taken three months to be solved,” said Osama Rabie, the head of the Suez Canal Authority (SCA).But questions about who will walk the plank financially are likely to entangle insurers and investigators, possibly for years. Investigators boarded the ship, now at anchor in the nearby Great Bitter Lake, on Tuesday, to find answers to what caused the grounding and who is ultimately responsible.The Ever Given's technical operator, Bernhard Schulte Shipmanagement, has repeatedly blamed strong winds. “Initial investigations rule out any mechanical or engine failure as a cause of the grounding,” it said. Observers pointed to the “sail effect”, where