PANAMA CITY — The city is gearing up for a major event: the Centennial of the opening of the Panama Canal on Aug. 15, 1914, with guests arriving from around the world.
Planned celebrations in 1914, to include the largest international armada of more than 100 ships led by the U.S. battleship USS Oregon (BB-3) were canceled with the outbreak of World War I.
This week the Panama Canal Authority (PCA) is hosting events surrounding the centennial taking place all over the city to include canal tours, receptions and a grand televised gala and illumination at night.
The 48-mile ship canal links the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic, and carries about 6 percent of world trade. It takes eight to 10 hours to complete a transit. The canal is open to all even in time of war. The canal saves ships almost 8,000 miles, weeks of travel around South American and fuel costs.
The original canal was completed the way the Defense Department wishes all its programs did–under budget and ahead of schedule. It cost $23 million (1914 dollars) less than expected and was completed six months ahead of schedule.
The total cost to the United States was some $375 million. The cost includes $10 million to Panama, and $40 million paid to the French company that went bankrupt and stopped work. Fortifications to protect the canal added another $12 million.
It took 34 years from when the French initiated the project in 1880 to the 1914 opening under the American effort, with leadership from several men detached from the Army Corps of Engineers.
The U.S military has used the canal since its inception, until the USS Midway (CV-41), the first U.S. warship designed to be too big to transit the canal. When considering the third set of locks, the Canal Authority asked the State Department if it wanted aircraft carrier size to be a factor in the design. The answer: no.
For the United States, the strategic value of the canal declined over time due to the size of the major Navy ships and because the United States broadened its vision to a global naval presence beyond what had been a two-ocean Navy focus.
The declared pivot to the Pacific has brought interest in the canal back, as well as the construction of a third set of locks for larger ships.
Navy ships frequently use the canal. For example, all four of the Littoral Combat Ships have transited the canal, with the USS Freedom (LCS-1) and USS Coronado (LCS-4) sustaining minor damage due to their width and the locks being a tight squeeze.
Military Sealift Command sends ships through the canal–three or four last month–as part of its work as the primary provider of ocean sealift for DoD.
Since the U.S. military left Panama in 1979 and the country has no military since the 1989 Operation Just Cause ousting Manual Noriega, the United States keeps its eye on what’s going on.
For example, the PANAMAX 2014 exercise, winding down now, engages a coalition of 15 nations based on the premise that Panama requested help to protect and guarantee the free passage of traffic on the canal while respecting its sovereignty.
The Panama Canal Expansion, building a second set of locks alongside the first, is generally quoted as costing about $5.2 billion, which is likely to rise, once a dispute between the contracted Spanish consortium and the Panama Canal Authority is finalized.
The original canal took a toll of more than 25,000 lives including the lives lost to the initial French construction and the American effort.
To date, six lives have been lost in accidents on the expansion project, which began in 2007.
When the expansion project is completed, now expected to be operational in January 2016, estimates are that canal traffic will double.
The original locks are 110 feet wide, by 1,050 feet. The Panamax ships that transit these two lanes of traffic each can carry some 4,400 containers.
The expansion project adds a third lane for traffic, allowing what are called Post Panamax ships that carry three times the number of containers to transit. These lanes will be 180 feet wide, 1,400 feet long and 60 feet deep. The new locks also have water-saving basins to address the water supply issue during Panama’s dry season.
The Panama Canal Authority (PCA) is starting to study a fourth lane of traffic to handle even larger ships. For example, the Maersk line has its environmentally conscious Triple E Ship built to carry more than 18,000 20-foot containers.
China has expressed interest in a fourth set of locks, which has created a stir since earlier this year it was granted permission to construct a canal through Nicaragua. China also manages massive container ports on either end of the Canal.
Panamanians shake their heads over this extremely expensive idea of a competing canal in Nicaragua, citing among other things, the earthquakes and volcanoes in the region.
The PCA and others expect business to boom with a third lane of traffic bolstering trade to the Asia Pacific region and the Pacific coast of South America, particularly. However, U.S. aircraft carriers will not transit the canal–they are too big with the flight deck.