jjares reviewed The Suez Canal: The History and Legacy of the World?s Most Famous Waterway on + 3275 more book reviews
Oddly enough, the Suez Canal was not built to aid the world with commerce but as an enterprise to show the glory of France (and to 'stick it' to England). At that time, England and France competed to show their prowess worldwide.
Creating a pathway from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea was not new. The Egyptians thought it an excellent idea and worked on it during the 19th Dynasty and again in Ptolemy's time. However, it silted back up quickly. Napoleon was interested in building the Suez Canal until he got erroneous information about a vast discrepancy in water depth between the Mediterranean and the Red Seas.
The next part of the book outlines the difficulties in getting the canal built, how the world wars affected the canal, and current conditions related to the canal. One new thing I learned was ships travel down the canal in one way or the other. but not at the same time. It takes between 11 and 16 hours to traverse the 100 miles of the canal and costs a whopping $350,000. The book said that cheap gas was causing many ships to go back to the old way around Africa's Cape of Good Hope to avoid the enormous canal bill.
Creating a pathway from the Mediterranean to the Red Sea was not new. The Egyptians thought it an excellent idea and worked on it during the 19th Dynasty and again in Ptolemy's time. However, it silted back up quickly. Napoleon was interested in building the Suez Canal until he got erroneous information about a vast discrepancy in water depth between the Mediterranean and the Red Seas.
The next part of the book outlines the difficulties in getting the canal built, how the world wars affected the canal, and current conditions related to the canal. One new thing I learned was ships travel down the canal in one way or the other. but not at the same time. It takes between 11 and 16 hours to traverse the 100 miles of the canal and costs a whopping $350,000. The book said that cheap gas was causing many ships to go back to the old way around Africa's Cape of Good Hope to avoid the enormous canal bill.
