There are 32 1 ships waiting to sail in the Suez Canal. Why is this road the main road to and from?

The Suez Canal was opened to traffic in 1869. It is a canal flush with the sea level, connecting the Indian Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean, and it is the nearest waterway connecting Europe and Asia.

From the map, we can clearly see how important the location of this canal is. The Mediterranean is a sandwich between Africa and Europe, connecting the Atlantic Ocean; The Red Sea is connected with the Indian Ocean, through which Asia can be reached. Before this waterway, the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea looked very close, a stranger close at hand, because there was a big electric light bulb in Egypt in the middle.

Before the Suez Canal, ships from Europe to Asia could only circle the whole southern Africa and bypass the Cape of Good Hope at the southernmost tip of Africa before entering the Indian Ocean. However, the Cape of Good Hope is a whirlpool where the warm current from the Indian Ocean and the cold current from the South Pole meet. Strong cold and warm air currents set off stormy waves all year round, and storms are as common as daily life. Murder waves often appear in rough seas, and the sea conditions are very bad. There are often shipwrecks and shipwrecks here, so the Cape of Good Hope route is one of the most dangerous navigation areas in the world.

The Cape of Good Hope has a long voyage, with a total distance of 1.98 million kilometers, while the Suez Canal has only 1. 1.6 million kilometers. A ship sails at a speed of 13.5 nautical miles per hour, and it takes nearly 1 1 day to complete the whole voyage. In the case of underdeveloped navigation technology in ancient times, it takes even longer. There is no direct route for land transportation from Europe to Asia, which is not only bad weather, but also low safety and high transportation cost.

Suez Canal is an open channel without sluice, and the whole process is basically straight. The water surface of the canal is about 300 meters wide and the depth of the canal is nearly 23 meters. It can sail ships of about 2 10000 tons, and the sailing speed can reach about 14 kilometers per hour. The opening of this canal has greatly shortened the sailing time from Europe to Asia. This canal is also an important entrance to Egypt's foreign exchange sources.

At present, the Suez Canal carries about 30% of the global container traffic, accounting for about 12% of the maritime trade volume. Dozens of large cargo ships pass through the canal every day, and about 25,000 cargo ships pass through it every year.

Suez Canal is the main waterway for transporting natural gas and oil resources. There are 8% natural gas resources and nearly 6,543.8+0,000 barrels/day of crude oil going through this route. Waterway transportation is the lowest transportation cost at present, and many commodities are shipped by sea.

During the blockade of the canal, 185 large cargo ships were stuck on the canal, including 7 ships carrying 2.5 million barrels of crude oil and 6.5 million barrels waiting to be transported. Crude oil futures were deeply affected, rising by nearly 6%. So the importance of Suez Canal is self-evident.