Republic Of Panama

Centro Educativo Bilingüe

Juan Demostenes Arosemena

Topic:

100 years of the Panama Canal

Subject:

Oral

Student:

Iveth Lezcano

Teacher:

Rolando Bedoya

Level:

Vlll°B

Index

1. Introduction2. Early proposals3. French construction attempts, 1881–18944. U.S. acquisition5. U.S. construction, 1904–19146. U.S. construction, 1904–19147. Later developments8. Layout9. Lock size10. Capacity11. Third set of locks project 12. Third set of locks project 13. Conclusion

Introduction

I would like to learn more about what is beautiful Panama Canal since my only knowledge is that this canal was built to link the Atlantic Ocean with the Pacific Ocean and many countries use it to not grab the long route as this is much shorter and thus be able to market faster.

HistoryEarly proposals

The earliest mention of a canal across the Isthmus of Panama dates back to 1534, when Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain, ordered a survey for a route through the Americas that would ease the voyage for ships traveling between Spain and Peru. Such a route would have given the Spanish a military advantage over the Portuguese. During an expedition from 1788 to 1793, Alessandro Malaspina outlined plans for its construction.

Given the strategic location of Panama and the potential offered by its narrow isthmus separating two great oceans, other trade links in the area were attempted over the years. The ill-fated Darien scheme was launched by the Kingdom of Scotland in 1698 to set up an overland trade route. Generally inhospitable conditions thwarted the effort, and it was abandoned in April 1700.

In 1849, the discovery of gold in California created great interest in a crossing between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The Panama Railway was built to cross the isthmus, and opened in 1855. This overland link became a vital piece of Western Hemisphere infrastructure, greatly facilitating trade and largely determining the later canal route.

An all-water route between the oceans was still seen as the ideal solution, and in 1855 William Kennish, a Manx-born engineer working for the United States government, surveyed the isthmus and issued a report on a route for a proposed Panama Canal.[6] His report was published in a book entitled The Practicality and Importance of a Ship Canal to Connect the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.

In 1877 Armand Reclus, an officer with the French Navy, and Lucien Napoléon Bonaparte Wyse, two engineers, surveyed the route and published a French proposal for a canal. French success in building the Suez Canal, while a lengthy project, encouraged planning for one to cross the isthmus.

French construction attempts, 1881–1894

The first attempt to construct a canal through what was then Colombia's province of Panama began on 1 January 1881. The project, designed as a sea-level canal (i.e., without locks), was under the leadership of Ferdinand de Lesseps, builder of the Suez Canal, with substantial financing and support from Paris. The cost and difficulty of construction in the rain-soaked tropics through unstable mountains exceeded expectations, and the French effort eventually went bankrupt after reportedly spending US$287,000,000 and losing an estimated 22,000 lives to accident and disease.

The French rushed to begin work, with insufficient prior study of the geology and hydrology of the region and the men who started and directed the project had little or no engineering training or experience. Canals cut through mountains had to continually be widened, and their slopes reduced, to minimize landslides into the canal. Steam shovels had been invented but were still primitive. Other mechanical and electrical equipment was limited in its capabilities, and steel equipment rusted rapidly in the climate.

Health risks posed to workers in the mosquito-infested Panamanian jungle, principally malaria and yellow fever, cost thousands of lives. Public health measures were ineffective because the role of the mosquito as a disease vector was then unknown. Conditions were downplayed in France to avoid recruitment problems,[9]but the high mortality made it difficult to maintain an experienced workforce. Beyond the health and technical difficulties, financial mismanagement and political corruptionalso contributed to the French failure.

By 1889 the company was bankrupt, and work was suspended on May 15. In the ensuing scandal, known as the Panama affair, various of those deemed responsible were prosecuted. Charles De Lesseps, son of Ferdinand De Lesseps, was found guilty of misappropriation of funds and sentenced to five years' imprisonment, though this was later overturned.

In 1894, a second French company, the Compagnie Nouvelle du Canal de Panama, was created to take over the project. A minimal workforce of a few thousand people was employed primarily to comply with the terms of the Colombian Panama Canal concession, to run the Panama Railroad, and to maintain the existing excavation and equipment in salable condition. The company sought a buyer for these assets, with an asking price of US$109,000,000.

U.S. acquisition

At this time, the President and the Senate of the United States were interested in establishing a canal across the isthmus, with some favoring a route acrossNicaragua (see Nicaragua Canal) and others advocating the purchase of the French interests in Panama. In June 1902, the U.S. Senate voted in favor of pursuing the Panamanian option, provided the necessary rights could be obtained.

On January 22, 1903, the Hay–Herrán Treaty was signed by United States Secretary of State John M. Hay and Dr. Tomás Herrán of Colombia. It would have granted the United States a renewable lease in perpetuity from Colombia on the land proposed for the canal. This is sometimes misinterpreted as the "99-year lease" because of misleading wording included in article 22 of the agreement. The treaty was ratified by the U.S. Senate on March 14, 1903, but the Senate of Colombia did not ratify it. Phillipe Bunau-Varilla, chief engineer and significant shareholder of the French canal company, told President Theodore Roosevelt and Hay of a possible revolt by Panamanian rebels who aimed to separate from Colombia, and hoped that the United States would support the rebels with U.S. troops and money. Roosevelt changed tactics, promising support for the separation of Panama from Colombia

On November 2, 1903, U.S. warships blocked sea lanes for possible Colombian troop movements en route to put down the rebellion. Panama declared independence the next day, November 3, 1903. The United States quickly recognized the new nation. On November 6, 1903, Phillipe Bunau-Varilla, Panama's ambassador to the United States, signed the Hay–Bunau-Varilla Treaty, granting rights to the United States to build and indefinitely administer the Panama Canal Zone and its defenses. Although Bunau-Varilla was serving as Panama's ambassador, he was a French citizen and not officially authorized to sign treaties on behalf of Panama without Panamanian review . This would later become a contentious diplomatic issue between Colombia, Panama and the United States.

President Roosevelt infamously stated that "I took the Isthmus, started the canal and then left Congress not to debate the canal, but to debate me". Several parties in the United States opposed this act of war on Colombia: the New York Times called the support given by the United States to Mr. Bunau-Varilla an "act of sordid conquest." The New York Evening Post called it a "vulgar and mercenary venture." More recently, historian George Tindall labeled it "one of the greatest blunders in American foreign policy." It is often cited as the classic example of U.S. gunboat diplomacy in Latin America, and the best illustration of what Roosevelt meant by the old African adage, "speak softly and carry a big stick [and] you will go far". After the revolution in 1903, the Republic of Panama became a U.S. protectorate until 1939.

In 1904, the United States bought the French equipment and excavations, including the Panama Railroad, for US$40 million, of which $30 million related to excavations completed, primarily in the Gaillard Cut (then called the Culebra Cut), valued at about $1.00 per cubic yard. The United States also paid the new country of Panama $10 million plus $250,000 more each year. (In 1921, the United States paid Colombia US$10 million, plus US$250,000 per annum for several years; in return, Colombia recognized Panama under the terms of the Thomson–Urrutia Treaty.)

U.S. construction, 1904–1914

The U.S. formally took control of the canal property on May 4, 1904, inheriting from the French a depleted workforce and a vast jumble of buildings, infrastructure and equipment, much of it in poor condition. A U.S. government commission, theIsthmian Canal Commission (ICC), was established to oversee construction and was given control of the Panama Canal Zone, over which the United States exercised sovereignty. The commission reported directly to Secretary of War William Howard Taft and was directed to avoid the inefficiency and corruption that had plagued the French 15 years earlier.

On May 6, 1904, President Theodore Roosevelt appointed John Findlay Wallace, formerly chief engineer and finally general manager of the Illinois Central Railroad, as chief engineer of the Panama Canal Project. Overwhelmed by the disease-plagued country and forced to used often dilapidated French infrastructure and equipment, as well as being frustrated by the overly bureaucratic ICC, Wallace resigned abruptly in June 1905. He was succeeded by John Frank Stevens, a self-educated engineer who had built the Great Northern Railroad. Stevens was not a member of the ICC; he increasingly viewed its bureaucracy as a serious hindrance and ended up bypassing the commission and sending requests and demands directly to the Roosevelt Administration in Washington.

One of Stevens' primary achievements in Panama was in building and rebuilding the housing, cafeterias, hotels, water systems, repair shops, warehouses, and other infrastructure needed by the thousands of incoming workers. Stevens began the recruitment effort to entice thousands of workers from the United States and other areas to come to the Canal Zone to work, and tried to provide accommodation in which the incoming workers could work and live in reasonable safety and comfort.

In 1905, a U.S. engineering panel was commissioned to review the canal design, which still had not been finalised. It recommended to President Roosevelt a sea-level canal, as had been attempted by the French. However, more extensive engineering studies favored a canal using a lock system to raise and lower ships from a large reservoir 85 ft (26 m) above sea level. This would create both the largest dam (Gatun Dam) and the largest man-made lake (Gatun Lake) in the world at that time. The water to refill the locks would be taken from Gatun Lake by opening and closing enormous gates and valves and letting gravity propel the water from the lake. Gatun Lake would connect to the Pacific through the mountains at the Gaillard (Culebra) Cut. Stevens successfully argued the case against the sea-level canal, convincing Roosevelt of the necessity and feasibility of the alternative scheme.

The construction of a canal with locks required the excavation of more than an additional 170,000,000 cu yd (129,974,326 m3) of material over and above the 30,000,000 cu yd (22,936,646 m3) excavated by the French. As quickly as possible, the Americans replaced or upgraded the old, unusable French equipment with new construction equipment that was designed for a much larger and faster scale of work. About 102 new large, railroad-mounted steam shovels were purchased and brought in from the United States. These were joined by enormous steam-powered cranes, giant hydraulic rock crushers, cement mixers, dredges, and pneumatic power drills, nearly all of which was manufactured by new, extensive machine-building technology developed and built in the United States. The railroad also had to be comprehensively upgraded with heavy-duty, double-tracked rails over most of the line to accommodate new rolling stock. In many places, the new Gatun Lake flooded over the original rail line, and a new line had to be constructed above Gatun Lake's waterline.

Colonel William C. Gorgas was appointed chief sanitation officer of the canal construction project in 1904. Gorgas implemented a range of measures to minimize the spread of deadly diseases, particularly malaria and yellow fever, which had recently been shown to be mosquito-borne following the work of Dr. Carlos Finlay and Dr. Walter Reed. There was investment in extensive sanitation projects, including city water systems, fumigation of buildings, spraying of insect-breeding areas with oil and larvicide, installation of mosquito netting and window screens, and elimination of stagnant water. After two years of extensive work, the mosquito-spread diseases were nearly eliminated (see also Health measures during the construction of the Panama Canal). Nevertheless, even with all this effort, about 5,600 workers died of disease and accidents during the U.S. construction phase of the canal.

In 1907, Stevens resigned as chief engineer. His replacement, appointed by President Theodore Roosevelt, was U.S. Army Major George Washington Goethals of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (soon to be promoted to lieutenant colonel and later to colonel), a strong, United States Military Academy–trained leader and civil engineer. Goethals would direct the work in Panama to a successful conclusion.

Goethals divided the engineering and excavation work into three divisions: Atlantic, Central, and Pacific. The Atlantic division, under Major William L. Sibert, was responsible for construction of the massive breakwater at the entrance to Limon Bay, the Gatun locks and their 5.6 km (3.5 mi) approach channel, and the immense Gatun Dam. The Pacific Division, under Sydney B. Williamson (the only civilian member of this high-level team), was similarly responsible for the Pacific 4.8 km (3.0 mi) breakwater in Panama Bay, the approach channel to the locks, and the Miraflores and Pedro Miguel locks and their associated dams and reservoirs.

The Central division, under Major David du Bose Gaillard of the United States Army Corps of Engineers, was assigned one of the most difficult parts: excavating the Gaillard Cut (then called the Culebra Cut) through the continental divide to connect Gatun Lake to the Pacific Panama Canal locks.

The building of the canal was completed in 1914, 401 years after Panama was first crossed by Vasco Núñez de Balboa. The United States spent almost $375,000,000 (roughly equivalent to $8,600,000,000 now to finish the project. This was by far the largest American engineering project of that or any previous era. The canal was formally opened on August 15, 1914, with the passage of the cargo ship SSAncon.

The opening of Panama Canal in 1914 caused a severe drop in traffic along Chileanports due to shifts in the maritime trade routes.

Throughout this time, Ernest "Red" Hallen was hired by the Isthmian Canal Commission to document the progress of the work

Later developmentsBy the 1930s it was seen that water supply would be an issue for the canal; this prompted the building of the Madden Dam across the Chagres River above Gatun Lake. The dam, completed in 1935, created Madden Lake (later Alajuela Lake), which provides additional water storage for the canal.[23] In 1939, construction began on a further major improvement: a new set of locks for the canal, large enough to carry the larger warships that the United States was building at the time and had planned to continue building. The work proceeded for several years, and significant excavation was carried out on the new approach channels, but the project was canceled after World War II.

After World War II, U.S. control of the canal and the Canal Zone surrounding it became contentious; relations between Panama and the United States became increasingly tense. Many Panamanians felt that the Canal Zone rightfully belonged to Panama; student protests were met by the fencing-in of the zone and an increased military presence there.[26] Demands for the United States to hand over the canal to Panama increased after the Suez Crisis in 1956, when the US used financial and diplomatic pressure to force France and the UK to abandon their attempt to retake control of the Suez Canal, previously nationalized by the Nasser regime in Egypt. Unrest culminated in riots on Martyr's Day, January 9, 1964, when about 20 Panamanians and 3–5 U.S. soldiers were killed.

A decade later, in 1974, negotiations toward a settlement began and resulted in the Torrijos–Carter Treaties. On September 7, 1977, the treaty was signed by President of the United States Jimmy Carter and Omar Torrijos, de facto leader of Panama. This mobilized the process of granting the Panamanians free control of the canal so long as Panama signed a treaty guaranteeing the permanent neutrality of the canal. The treaty led to full Panamanian control effective at noon on December 31, 1999, and the Panama Canal Authority (ACP) assumed command of the waterway. The Panama Canal remains one of the chief revenue sources for Panama.

Before this handover, the government of Panama held an international bid to negotiate a 25-year contract for operation of the container shipping ports located at the canal's Atlantic and Pacific outlets. The contract was not affiliated with the ACP or Panama Canal operations and was won by the firm Hutchison Whampoa, a Hong Kong–based shipping interest owned by Li Ka-shing.

LayoutThe canal consists of artificial lakes, several improved and artificial channels, and three sets of locks. An additional artificial lake, Alajuela Lake (known during the American era as Madden Lake), acts as a reservoir for the canal. The layout of the canal as seen by a ship passing from the Atlantic to the Pacific is as follows:

From the formal marking line of the Atlantic Entrance, one enters Limón Bay (Bahía Limón), a large natural harbour. The entrance runs 8.7 km (5.4 mi). It provides a deepwater port (Cristóbal), with facilities like multimodal cargo exchange (to and from train) and the Colón Free Trade Zone (a free port).

A 2.0 mi (3.2 km) channel forms the approach to the locks from the Atlantic side.

The Gatun locks, a three-stage flight of locks 1.9 km (1.2 mi) long, lifts ships to the Gatun Lake level, some 26.5 m (87 ft) above sea level.

Gatun Lake, an artificial lake formed by the building of the Gatun Dam, carries vessels 24.2 km (15 mi) across the isthmus. It is the summit canal stretch, fed by the Gatun river and emptied by basic lock operations.

From the lake, the Chagres River, a natural waterway enhanced by the damming of Gatun Lake, runs about 8.5 km (5.3 mi). Here the upper Chagres river feeds the high level canal stretch.

The Culebra Cut slices 12.6 km (7.8 mi) through the mountain ridge, crosses the continental divide and passes under the Centennial Bridge.

The single-stage Pedro Miguel lock, which is 1.4 km (0.87 mi) long, is the first part of the descent with a lift of 9.5 m (31 ft).

The artificial Miraflores Lake, 1.7 km (1.1 mi) long, and 16.5 m (54 ft) above sea level.

The two-stage Miraflores locks, is 1.7 km (1.1 mi) long, with a total descent of 16.5 m (54 ft) at mid-tide.

From the Miraflores locks one reaches Balboa harbour, again with multimodal exchange provision (here the railway meets the shipping route again). Nearby is Panama City.

From this harbour an entrance/exit channel leads to the Pacific Ocean (Gulf of Panama), 13.2 km (8.2 mi) from the Miraflores locks, passing under the Bridge of the Americas.

Thus, the total length of the canal is 77.1 km (48 mi).

Lock sizeThe size of the locks determines the maximum size of a ship that can pass through them. Because of the importance of the canal to international trade, many ships are built to the maximum size allowed. These are known as Panamax vessels. A Panamax cargo ship typically has a DWT of 65,000–80,000tonnes, but its actual cargo is restricted to about 52,500 tonnes because of the 12.6 m (41.2 ft) draftrestrictions within the canal. The longest ship ever to transit the canal was the San Juan Prospector (now Marcona Prospector), an ore-bulk-oil carrier that is 296.57 m (973 ft) long with a beam of 32.31 m (106 ft).

Initially the locks at Gatun had been designed to be 28.5 m (94 ft) wide. In 1908, the United States Navy requested that width be increased to at least 36 m (118 ft), which would allow the passage of U.S. naval ships. Eventually a compromise was made and the locks were built 33.53 m (110.0 ft) wide. Each lock is 320 m (1,050 ft) long, with the walls ranging in thickness from 15 m (49 ft) at the base to 3 m (9.8 ft) at the top. The central wall between the parallel locks at Gatun is 18 m (59 ft) thick and over 24 m (79 ft) high. The steel lock gates measure an average of 2 m (6.6 ft) thick, 19.5 m (64 ft) wide, and 20 m (66 ft) high.[34] It is the size of the locks, specifically the Pedro Miguel Locks, along with the height of the Bridge of the Americas at Balboa, that determine the Panamax metric and limit the size of ships that may use the canal.

The 2006 third set of locks project will create larger locks, allowing bigger ships to transit through deeper and wider channels. The allowed dimensions of ships will increase by 25% in length, 51% in beam, and 26% in draft, as defined byNew Panamax metrics.

CapacityThe canal is currently handling more vessel traffic than had ever been envisioned by its builders. In 1934 it was estimated that the maximum capacity of the canal would be around 80 million tons per year; as noted above, canal traffic in 2009 reached 299.1 million tons of shipping.

The water that is used to raise and lower vessels in the Canal is fed by gravity from Gatun Lake (pictured above) into each set of locks.

To improve capacity, a number of improvements have been imposed on the current canal system. These improvements aim to maximize the possible use of current locking system:

Implementation of an enhanced locks lighting system;

Construction of two tie-up stations in Gaillard Cut;

Widening Gaillard Cut from 192 to 218 metres (630 to 715 ft);

Improvements to the tugboat fleet;

Implementation of the carousel lockage system in Gatun locks;

Development of an improved vessel scheduling system;

Deepening of Gatun Lake navigational channels from 10.4 to 11.3 metres (34 to 37 ft) PLD;

Modification of all locks structures to allow an additional draft of about 0.30 metres (0.98 ft);

Deepening of the Pacific and Atlantic entrances;

Construction of a new spillway in Gatun, for flood control.

These improvements will enlarge the capacity from 280–90 million PCUMS (2008) to 330–40 PCUMS (2012).

Third set of locks project

The current plan is for two new flights of locks to be built parallel to, and operated in addition to, the old locks: one east of the existing Gatun locks, and one southwest of the Miraflores locks, each supported by approach channels. Each flight will ascend from sea level directly to the level of Gatun Lake; the existing two-stage ascent at Miraflores and Pedro Miguel locks will not be replicated. The new lock chambers will feature sliding gates, doubled for safety, and will be 427 m (1,400 ft) long, 55 m (180 ft) wide, and 18.3 m (60 ft) deep. This will allow the transit of vessels with a beam of up to 49 m (160 ft), an overall length of up to 366 m (1,200 ft) and a draft of up to 15 m (49 ft), equivalent to a container ship carrying around 12,000 containers, each 6.1 m (20 ft) in length (TEU).

The new locks will be supported by new approach channels, including a 6.2 km (3.9 mi) channel at Miraflores from the locks to the Gaillard Cut, skirting Miraflores Lake. Each of these channels will be 218 m (720 ft) wide, which will require post-Panamax vessels to navigate the channels in one direction at a time. The Gaillard Cut and the channel through Gatun Lake will be widened to at least 280 m (920 ft) on the straight portions and at least 366 m (1,200 ft) on the bends. The maximum level of Gatun Lake will be raised from 26.7 m (88 ft) to 27.1 m (89 ft).

Each flight of locks will be accompanied by nine water reutilization basins (three per lock chamber), each basin being about 70 m (230 ft) wide, 430 m (1,400 ft) long and 5.50 m (18 ft) deep. These gravity-fed basins will allow 60% of the water used in each transit to be reused; the new locks will consequently use 7% less water per transit than each of the existing lock lanes. The deepening of Gatun Lake and the raising of its maximum water level will also provide capacity for significantly more water storage. These measures are intended to allow the expanded canal to operate without constructing new reservoirs.

The estimated cost of the project is US$5.25 billion. The project is designed to allow for an anticipated growth in traffic from 280 million PC/UMS tons in 2005 to nearly 510 million PC/UMS tons in 2025. The expanded canal will have a maximum sustainable capacity of about 600 million PC/UMS tons per year. Tolls will continue to be calculated based on vessel tonnage, and will not depend on the locks used.

The new locks are expected to open for traffic in 2015. The present locks, which will be 100 years old by that time, will then be able to give engineers greater access for maintenance, and are projected to continue operating indefinitely. An article in the February 2007 issue of Popular Mechanics magazine describes the plans for the canal, focusing on the engineering aspects of the expansion project. There is also a follow-up article in the February 2010 issue of Popular Mechanics.

On September 3, 2007, thousands of Panamanians stood across from Paraíso Hill in Panama to witness a huge initial explosion and launch of the Expansion Program. The first phase of the project will be dry excavations of the 218 meters (715 feet) wide trench connecting the Gaillard Cut with the Pacific coast, removing 47 million cubic meters of earth and rock. By June 2012, a 30 m reinforced concrete monolith had been completed, the first of 46 such monoliths which will line the new Pacific-side lock walls.[76] By early July 2012, however, it was announced that the canal expansion project had fallen six months behind schedule, leading the expansion to open in April 2015 rather than October 2014, as originally planned.

It was announced in July 2009 that the Belgian dredging company Jan De Nul, together with a consortium of contractors consisting of the Spanish Sacyr Vallehermoso, the Italian Impregilo, and the Panamanian company Grupo Cusa, had been awarded the contract to build the six new locks. The contract will result in $100 million in dredging works over the next few years for the Belgian company and a great deal of work for its construction division. The design of the locks is a carbon copy of the Berendrecht Lock, which is 68m wide and 500m long, making it the largest lock in the world. Completed in 1989 by the Port of Antwerp, which De Nul helped build, the company still has engineers and specialists who were part of that project.

In January 2014 a contract dispute threatened the progress of the project. There was a delay of less than 2 months however, with work by the consortium members reaching goals by June 2014. 

Conclusion

Panama Canal allowed to increase business and profits that have been able to build other great works in our republic.

He has trained a lot of Panamanian professionals who manage this eighth wonder of the world.