Herman the German and Locks are the KEY!

 Herman the German and Locks are the KEY!

Funny how a sunset can make even a giant piece of metal attractive. 😊  This is Lake Gatun - the man-made lake that connects the system of locks that lowers and raises ships to and from either the Pacific Ocean in Panama City or the Atlantic Ocean in Colón.  The giant tower pictured above is “Herman the German” an enormous crane that is used to lift the lock gates for repair.  These gates measure 187 feet long by 72 feet tall, are 26 feet thick and weigh 2,300 tons.  It takes a Big Boy to do this and Herman is one Big Boy! Believe it or not, Herman was created by Hitler and came to be property of the US as reparations from World War II. After the California shipyard where Herman was stationed closed, it was moved and utilized here in the canal.  We have been here for 3 weeks and have walked by Herman many, many times but It still grabs Kirby’s attention and respect each time we pass.

You never know what you’ll see on a “flippy walk.”  After returning from a 7 mile walk on The Pipeline Trail yesterday, we heard a commotion coming from the lake. A ship was blaring its horn for probably 3 minutes straight. Just as we were gearing up to dash to the lake to investigate, the sound stopped and we didn’t think any more of it. Later, on our flippy walk, we were surprised to see a ship anchored in the lake across from Herman.  If only I could speak Spanish and could ask someone about it! (I’m working on it - Thanks Reyna!) I’m willing to bet this has something to do with the sounding of that horn. 

Our curiosity led us to forego our usual morning “shoe walk” - still recovering from the 7 mile-er from yesterday - and “flippy walk” to check on the stationary ship. As of now, it’s still there and we still know nothing about it. However, as luck would have it, a Panamax ship was cruising through the canal.  We had the opportunity to compare the ships that go through the old lock system with the Ginormous ones that, since 2016 when the new locks opened, now represent the shipping business. Holy Cats! They are HUGE! And so is Herman!

…and the Locks are the Key!

The French started the canal with plans to dig a ditch all the way through the skinniest part of Panama in order to cut off thousands of nautical miles of transit around South America. They ran into issues when they discovered that a ditch through even the skinniest part of Panama meant an awful lot of dirt removal. Another hitch lies in the fact that the Pacific Ocean sits higher than the Atlantic.  Trying to create a sea level canal through mountainous terrain and the continental divide, coupled with the rampant malaria that accompanied the tropical climate, caused the French to go bankrupt.

The US saw the creation of the canal as a path to becoming a super power and went all in on the project. At one point, a third of the steel workers from Pittsburg were working on the canal.  Because 45,000 men came from countries all over the world for the work and then their women and children joined them, a whole society had to be created here - police, a judicial system, schools, etc.  Understanding this was critical to the success of the project, along with the use of trains to move the dirt and rock and most importantly the idea of a lock system - as opposed to a sea level canal that would cause massive flooding - led to the American success. The Locks are most definitely the key!

Between 1904 and 1914, 27,000 people sacrificed their lives for the project. The US managed to get malaria under control - earlier it wasn’t understood that mosquitoes carried the disease and the legs of hospital beds were set in dishes of water to keep ants away from the patients. Little did they know they were spreading malaria with every dishful. 

But now the canal belongs to Panama and is thriving. In 2016 they opened additional locks to accommodate the bigger Panamax ships mentioned previously and an average of 40 ships utilize this shortcut every day.

I took few pictures when we visited the locks with Mike and Lisa. It’s hard to make sense of this in a photo.  In the first picture above, a cargo ship has pulled into a lock. It is sitting at the same level as Lake Gatun, from which it came. You can see the empty lock right beside it - the black empty pit that looks like it’s below the ship.  The water from the lock the ship is sitting in flows into the empty lock next to it.  This lowers the ship to the level of the lock in front of it. The massive doors, that Herman lifts for repairs, open and the ship moves into that lock. Once again, the water flows from the lock where the ship sits into the lock next to it, lowering the ship to the level of the ocean where it continues on to bring all kinds of goodies to the shores of the US and eventually our local Walmart.

In the second photo above, a different ship is sitting at sea level, waiting for the gates to open and it’s travels continue. You can see how much lower it sits at sea level than the ship in the top photo, which is at the level of Lake Gatun.

Having locks side by side allows the water to be used twice to lower ships before it travels out to sea, it’s duty complete.  I guess this mixture of fresh water flowing into sea water does a number on the fish. Fresh water fish don’t survive in sea water and vice versa.  

It’s interesting to live in an area that isn’t concerned about a lack of water. Here the locals get tired of the raining and flooding and have no concept of what it’s like on our DRY land farm. They have not witnessed a reduction of rainfall here over the last several years. Good to hear!