Twenty-five crew members remain stuck on board.
A few weeks ago, Egypt was frantically trying to get the massive container ship Ever Given out of the Suez Canal. Now, authorities are saying that the vessel is not allowed to leave. In the latest complication to the ill-fated voyage, Egypt has seized the Ever Given over its owners’ “failure to pay an amount of $900 million,” the state-run news outlet Ahram Gate reported. That amount represents the total compensation that Egypt believes it is owed for the six-day blockage of the Suez Canal, including lost revenue from ships that would ordinarily have traveled through the canal during that time, as well as costs for damage to the crucial waterway and the equipment and manpower deployed in the 144-hour scramble to free the ship. Since being dislodged from the narrow section of the canal where it ran aground in late March, blocking commerce worth billions of dollars, the Ever Given has been anchored in Egypt’s Great Bitter Lake, which is located at the midpoint of the canal. Twenty-five crew members, all Indian nationals, remain stuck on board.
