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Panama Canal may further reduce ship traffic as El Niño intensifies

Get you up to speed: Panama Canal may cut ship traffic further as El Niño strengthens

What remains unclear — It is uncertain how rainfall in the coming months will influence further restrictions on ship traffic through the Panama Canal.

Panama Canal may further reduce ship traffic as El Niño intensifies

NewsPanama Canal may cut ship traffic further as El Niño strengthens

Canal authorities may further reduce ship traffic if a strengthening El Niño worsens the country’s drought.

Published On 8 Sep 20268 Sep 2026

Panama could impose further cuts on the number of ships sailing through the Panama Canal, an official said, as a strengthening El Niño raises fears of water shortages at one of the world’s busiest maritime trade routes.

The warning from the new administrator of the Panama Canal Authority, Ilya Espino de Marotta, on Monday came after the government declared a nationwide state of emergency over El Niño on August 26.

The canal, which handles 5 percent of global maritime trade, has already reduced the maximum number of ships allowed through daily, from 36 last month to 34 starting on September 4.

A further reduction will start on September 15, when the limit will be 32 ships.

Espino, who took over as administrator of the Panama Canal Authority on Monday, told the AFP news agency that restrictions could be tightened again if the drought does not subside.

She said she was not ruling out the possibility that in February or March, the limits “could be reduced to 29 or something similar”.

Ships wait in the ocean near Panama, Central America [File: Priscila Zambotto/Getty]

She said rainfall over the coming months would determine whether further restrictions are needed.

“Depending on how much rain falls in September, October and November – the three critical months – that will determine whether I need to lower any slots further in January, February or March,” she told the Reuters news agency last week.

The restrictions are not expected to become as severe as during the 2023-24 drought, when daily crossings fell as low as 22.

The Panama Canal depends on freshwater to operate the locks that raise and lower vessels travelling between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Water comes mainly from the artificial Gatun and Alajuela lakes, which are replenished by rainfall.

An average transit consumes about 200 million litres (about 53 million gallons) of water.

That dependence makes the 80km (50-mile) canal particularly vulnerable to prolonged dry weather, and levels in both reservoirs have already dropped with the onset of El Niño.

This year’s El Niño – which affects weather patterns and pushes up global temperatures – is expected to be the strongest since record-keeping began four decades ago.

The Panama Canal Miraflores Locks system has huge water chambers and lock gates [Nico De Pasquale Photography/Getty]

Apart from reducing the number of vessels transiting the Panama Canal, authorities have also reduced their maximum draft, from 15.2 metres to 14.6 metres (50 feet to 48 feet).

Draft ⁠is the depth of water a ship needs to float safely. A lower draft limit means vessels may have to carry less cargo to pass through the canal.

The disruption comes at a sensitive time for global shipping.

The Panama Canal’s importance has increased as traffic through the Strait of Hormuz in the Middle East has fallen sharply amid the US-Israel war on Iran. Some vessels have recently paid more than $1m at auction to secure transit ‌slots through the canal.

Panama is betting on a new reservoir at Rio Indio – a river in the country’s centre – as a longer-term solution.

The project is intended to provide water for canal operations and more than half of Panama’s population for the next 50 years, but it is expected to take five to six years to complete.

Espino, the new administrator, told Reuters that the reservoir would “ensure that the canal never again has to resort to lowering the draft or reducing the number of transits”.

Floating island in British Columbia reservoir appears and disappears 20 miles away

Get you up to speed: Mysterious Canadian island ‘vanishes’ and then reappears 20 miles away | News World

What remains unclear — The exact mechanism of the floating island’s dislodgement and its subsequent movement within Williston Reservoir has not been confirmed.

Floating island in British Columbia reservoir appears and disappears 20 miles away

The island, in a Canadian reservoir, disappeared mysteriously (Picture: Facebook)

The world has no shortage of islands. There are over 900,000 of them, according to research, from officially inhabited islands through to tiny ones which exist purely as a dot of untouched land.

However, few are as mysterious as the one which has left folk in British Columbia baffled, after it appeared in the middle of a major lake, promptly vanished, and then showed up again 20 miles away.

The floating island in Williston Lake — the largest body of freshwater in British Columbia — was first spotted in early August by boaters.

But then, just days later, the island was nowhere to be seen, leaving locals wondering where it had got to and even speculating that the original image of the tree-filled stretch of land could have been AI-generated.

Now you see it…now you don’t (Picture: Facebook)

Bob Gammer, a spokesperson for government-owned utility firm BC Hydro, which is responsible for maintaining the reservoir, said in an interview: ‘We first heard about it from a member of the media in northern British Columbia who had seen a Facebook post.

‘Someone had been out on the reservoir in their boat and came across this island.

A satellite image which had been taken before this, at the end of July, confirmed its existence, showing the island floating in the middle of the lake.

However, by the time another image was taken on August 5, the island had disappeared, sparking speculation as to where it had got to.

It was only when further satellite footage, followed by eyewitness accounts from people flying overhead, emerged that the island was located — around 30km (18.65) miles from where it was first spotted, and far closer to shore.

The island was spotted drifting around Williston Lake (Picture: Shutterstock / wayne valiquette)

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BC Hydro has since said that the island likely measures around one hectare — making it roughly the same size as 1.5 American football fields.

As to where it might have come from, the company has some theories about that too, suggesting it was formed from accumulating driftwood, which allowed trees and plant life to blossom.

‘Our best understanding from simple observations is that this is probably an island that grew up on top of a bunch of woody debris that had been compressed together, crowded into a sheltered bay, along the shoreline of the reservoir for many, many years,’ Gammer explained.

‘And then, eventually, those logs started to decompose. And the trees grew up, and they’ve kind of knitted to hold all of these floating logs and woody debris together.

‘And at some point, when the reservoir rose, with the spring snowmelt filling up the reservoir, it may have dislodged this island of logs and vegetation up and away from the shoreline, and then the wind pushed it out into open water.’

He also warned people against actually trying to set foot on the island itself, as the surface appears to be unstable — although that hasn’t stopped people wanting to try.

Rocky Avery, one of the boaters who originally posted footage of the island to social media, said he would ‘totally jump’ on that island if he were able to, adding: ‘It’s probably a bit shaky on the outer sections, but with those huge trees in the centre, I imagine someone could walk on it.’

Forty Acre Bog on Lake Chippewa in Wisconsin has also attracted its share of attention (Picture: Google maps)

It’s not the first time that a floating, moving island has been spotted in a significant body of water.

Another, Forty Acre Bog on Lake Chippewa in Wisconsin is thought to have been formed by peat bogs breaking away from the bottom of the lake and rising to the surface.

That island is home to several small species of wildlife, including frogs and salamanders, and has previously been moved by local boaters to prevent it from colliding with a nearby bridge.

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