Panamanian Neopanamax cargo vessel opens regular traffic thru expanded Canal

A Panamanianflagged Neopanamax cargo vessel carrying liquefied natural gas was the first ship to make a regular transit through the newlyexpanded Panama Canal on Monday.

The Lycaste Peace en route for Hitachi, Japan, entered the new and larger Agua Clara locks on the Atlantic side of the waterway on Monday morning at 6 a.m. and was scheduled to arrive at the Cocoli locks on the Pacific side at about 1:50 p.m., a spokesman for the Panama Canal Authority, or ACP, told EFE.

Following the Lycaste Peace, the Butterfly a petroleum derivatives tanker flying the flag of Bermuda entered the Agua Clara locks at 8:15 a.m. the spokesman said.

The ACP on Sunday inaugurated the third set of expanded locks with the transit of China’s Cosco Shipping Panama another Neopanamax vessel which can carry more than 9,400 containers, with a ceremony attended by a dozen heads of state, including Spain’s King Juan Carlos, and 20,000 spectators distributed around the new locks.

The expanded interoceanic waterway can now accommodate vessels carrying up to 13,000 containers to make the transit, triple the size of the largest ships that were previously able to traverse the centuryold Canal.

With the new infrastructure, the Canal will double its annual cargo capacity from 300 million to 600 million tons, according to the Canal administration.

The canal expansion was launched in the year 2007 with an initial budget of $5.25 billion.

The main project within the expansion was the construction of the third set of locks, a contract worth $3.12 billion that was awarded to the international GUPC consortium led by Spain’s Sacyr and including Salini Impregilo of Italy, Jan de Nul of Belgium and Panama’s CUSA, and which has racked up close to $3.5 billion in cost overruns.