In March 2021, a huge container ship was blown sideways by a sandstorm and jammed diagonally in a narrow stretch of the Suez Canal, blocking it entirely.

Because 12% of all global trade moves through the canal, experts calculated its closure was costing the global economy $400 million per hour!

The Suez Canal is really just an extension of the Red Sea, a narrow, 1,200-mile-long strip of water that began opening 20 million years ago between North Africa and Arabia.

It almost connected the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean Sea naturally but fell 120 miles short.

In the 1860s, 1.5 million workers spent a decade digging that last 120 miles: a narrow canal that connects several natural lakes, which today serve as harbors.

Nearly 20,000 cargo ships and tankers now take this route each year, a shortcut that avoids an expensive and dangerous journey around the Horn of Africa.

To free the stranded ship, a fleet of tug boats, dredging ships, and salvage divers pulled and dug for six days and nights, working around the clock.

On the seventh day, a rising tide gave just a few more inches of lift, and they finally freed the bow.

Hundreds of waiting ships resumed their trip through the canal, carrying products for millions of people in the region.