Panama is currently facing a severe drought, exacerbated by a strong El Niño weather system, leading to a significant reduction in daily transit at the Panama Canal. This has resulted in substantial delays across various vessel categories, with the situation expected to worsen in the coming months. The Panama Canal Authority (ACP) has halted the prebooking of transit passages, causing uncertainty in vessel transit schedules. Due to the late arrival of the rainy season and insufficient precipitation in the Canal watershed, transit capacity has been drastically reduced to 40%-50% of full capacity.
Recent weeks have seen no improvement, and the ACP has implemented additional vessel transit reductions to conserve water in the locks, leading to heavy congestion. Waiting times for transit are now expected to be around 16 days for both northbound (NB) and southbound (SB) vessels. The unusual situation has prompted the ACP to take measures to mitigate the impact.
In the last days it did happen that carriers decided to sail via Cape Horn.