Made to be driven. What do you drive?
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Still leading the way, and just catching proof it went via the expansion 🙂 Sorry, Ive been out for a birthday lunch and had the fun of watching on my phone, not posting here… Ho hum, I doubt anyone but me could really give a rat’s ass anyhow… but this is for me for posterity so :-p
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So I’ve been using MarineTraffic mostly, but since I’d still not heard anything from Progress Ace I flipped over to VesselFinder – which hasn’t been as reliable to date but it’s come up trumps this time. Just caught it in time to see the Progress Ace’s leading the whole convoy into the Bitter Lake right now 🙂
We also get an update on the ETA for Barcelona – 12th August 10:00 – which is notably sooner than the scheduled 13 Aug 15 08:00 from the ship’s offical itinerary. I won’t hold my breath… but at least from here on in AIS signals should better and hence updates more frequent.
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So apparently there’s around a two day queue backed up at the south end of the Suez canal.
According to the BBC there was an official opening ceremony which presumably shut down the whole canal for quite a while. Bollocks. The Progress Ace was originally due to go through the canal on the day of the opening; hence the schedule being pushed back a day I guess, but it arrived at the south end of the canal at least 36 hours ago now and it still hasn’t got through. Other ships that arrived around the same time are starting to make their way through the canal now as I head off for the 26th sleep-to-go.
If nothing else it’s been a little fun working out the track of the new expansion by watching other ships run off the watercourse on the map :). The Progress Ace will be one of the first ships to run the route… so by consequence so will our new 3 🙂 Thinking about it; it’ll be the first batch of 3’s to ever do it 🙂
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Another day done it’s been great to have been monitoring progress through the Red Sea. Looking at progress being made I’m left wondering the route that was taken across the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea. Straight line at the progress being made today would have completed at least a day sooner but I guess the route keeps closer to the shore line in case of difficulties – and presumably tidal/sea condition reasons.
Back on the forecasting tip it’s pretty clear that the ship should arrive at the Suez southern entrance in plenty of time for the 06:00 start for the north bound convoy at 06:00 on the 7th 🙂
29 sleeps due… though as I’ve said before I really doubt the 1st September’s really all that likely…
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Weaning myself off checking every five minutes we’re steaming along nicely: Eritrea on the port side. 🙂
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The last 24 hours have been like watching paint dry; goodness knows how many times I’ve clicked on the refresh button on the shipping tracker website hoping for an update on the Progress Ace. Nothing… but then I got an email alert saying it had come back in range – which put a smile on my face 🙂
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MOL’s updated the schedule for the Progress Ace. No surprise as I’d worked out they were behind time already, but it’s now confirmed: arrival in Zeebrugge ICO Bastenaken now estimated 19 Aug 15 09:55. That definitely misses the first possible connection to Southampton that would have been on the 17th due shortly after the Progress had docked but I don’t know if a ship to ship decant would be JIT possible. I doubt it. Next not scheduled until the 24th so the anticipated 1st delivery looks like it’s slipping away…
Suez 08 Aug 15 08:00 >> 08 Aug 15 18:00
Barcelona 12 Aug 15 20:00 >> 13 Aug 15 21:00
Zeebrugge ICO Bastenaken 19 Aug 15 09:55 >> 19 Aug 15 17:55