Ship stuck in Egypt’s Suez Canal

A Hong Kong-flagged ship has run aground in Egypt’s Suez Canal causing traffic jam, reports say adding that authorities are at work to refloat the ship.
“M/V XIN HAI TONG 23 has grounded in the Suez Canal at KM 159/0400 hrs”, Leth Agencies said in a tweet.
The situation, the agency said, left behind 4 vessels from the early convoy in addition to the ordinary group which was planned to enter the Suez Canal at about 0600 hrs.
Three Egyptian tugboats have been mobilized to help the vessel to refloat and continue its course.
Two tugs, Sky News reports, managed to swing the carrier around and it now appears to be heading towards the Suez Gulf under its own steam. The Suez Canal runs between Port Said on the Mediterranean Sea, and Suez on the Red Sea. In 2021, Japanese shipping ship “Ever Given” stuck for six days when it hit the bank of a single-lane stretch of the canal, about 3.7 miles north of the southern entrance, near the city of Suez.
The incident caused a backlog that delayed the journeys of hundreds of ships, forcing some of them to take a much longer route around the southern tip of Africa.
Also last year, tug boats reportedly refloated an oil tanker that was briefly stranded in the canal after suffering a technical fault with its rudder.