International Canals

What is a canal?
• A canal is a human-made
waterway that allows boats and
ships to pass from one body of water
to another.
• Canals are also used to transport
water for irrigation and other human
uses. While the advent of more
efficient forms of transportation has
reduced the need for canals, they
still play a vital role as conduits for
transportation and fostering global
commerce.
 Hope you
remember
yesterday’s story
on
European Rivers!!!
KIEL CANAL THROUGH
PICTURES
 Kiel Canal
• Connecting the Baltic Sea with the North Sea.
• Opened in 1895, the 98 km-long Kiel Canal helps vessels to bypass the
longer route that passes via Denmark (peninsula of Jutland), which is
regarded as quite unstable maritime route, saving an average of 250
nautical miles.
 Canal Facts
• The importance of the Panama and Suez canals to global trade cannot be
understated, but neither can claim the title of busiest canal in the world.
• That goes to the Kiel Canal, which links the North Sea to the Baltic Sea, slicing
through northern Germany. It is 98km long, saving a journey that would
otherwise be about 450km through notoriously stormy seas, and its annual vessel
count typically marginally outnumbers those using the Panama and Suez routes.
• The oldest canal in the world that is still active is the Grand Canal in China, or, to
give it its full name, the Beijing–Hangzhou Grand Canal. It is a Unesco World
Heritage Site, with its oldest part dating back to the year 5BC.
• Other shipping routes, such as the English Channel and the Strait of Malacca, are
busier than the canals, but these occur naturally. 
 Canals & Locks
• What is a Canal Lock?
On canalized rivers and artificial canals, the waterway consists of a series of
level steps formed by impounding barriers through which vessels pass by a
navigation lock.
Basically, this device consists of a rectangular chamber with fixed sides,
movable ends, and facilities for filling and emptying.
Movable gates must be strong enough to withstand the water pressure
arising from the level difference between adjacent pounds.
Panama Canal
Just how vital is the waterways like Suez and Kiel
Canal to global trade?
• There are hundreds of shipping canals all over the world, in different length,
width and depth, facilitating easy movement of a variety of vessels on an
everyday basis. Some of these canals are also the busiest traffic routes around the
world.
• Panama Canal saves cargo having to circumnavigate the whole of North or South
America, or undertake a costly and time-consuming land journey.
• The Suez Canal saves a trip around the whole of the African continent and means
that the cargo doesn’t have to pass through dozens of countries to get from Asia
to Europe, or vice versa. 
• Air freight – if an option at all – costs an average of three times as much as
shipping freight. 
Suez Canal
 Suez Canal
• Opened in November 1869, the 193.30 km long Suez Canal is an artificial sea-
level waterway located in Egypt. It provides a shortest maritime route between
Europe and the regions which share a border with the Indian Ocean and the
Western Pacific Ocean.
• The distance the Suez Canal saves ships is considerable: a ship going from the
port of Saudi Arabia to Rotterdam in the Netherlands will have to travel 10,358km
going through the canal; the alternative journey around the tip of South Africa
would be 17,975km. This cuts the journey length by 42%.
• In the 2019/20 financial year it handled 19,311 vessels with a 1.2 billion net
tonnage. Oil accounts for 23.1% of the cargo passing through the canal.
Panama Canal
Panama Canal
 Panama Canal
• The Panama Canal bisects the umbilical cord that ties together North and South
America. Although the canal is a mere 82km in length, the width of the country
of Panama at one of its narrowest points, it is among the most iconic pieces of
infrastructure in the world, and was considered one of the Seven Wonders of the
Modern World by the American Society of Civil Engineers.
• Crossing the Panama Canal takes somewhere between eight and ten hours. When
compared with the alternative routes – circumnavigating South America and the
notorious Cape Horn, or taking a more northern route and negotiating the icy
waters of the Arctic Sea – this short period of time saves any container vessel
about 22 days and a great deal of peril. For ships using the canal to avoid the
Cape of Good Hope around the southern tip of South America, the voyage is
shortened by about 15,000km.
• Rhine-Main-Danube Canal
• Linking three important rivers in the heart of Western Europe, the
Rhine-Main-Danube Canal or the Europa Canal was originally built as
early as the 1938s. The Europa Canal is a major marine transportation
gateway linking the North Sea to the Black Sea, via the Atlantic Ocean.
• Volga-Don Canal
• The Volga-Don ship canal interlinks the Russian rivers Volga and Don,
providing an important water passage through the Azoff Sea (a bay of
the Black Sea) and the Caspian Sea to the major oceanic networks.
The City of Water
• Referred to as “The City of
Water,” Venice is the crown jewel
of water cities.
• Romantic gondolas, and Italian
architecture along the Grand
Canal helped earn this status.
• Stitched together with over 150
canals that have become central
to its character, Venice has
decayed since its heyday and has
more tourists than residents, but
the romantic charm remains.