The Suez Canal is clear, but shipping is still broken
02 April 2021
International shipping and supply chains are in rough shape, even without a container ship lodged in the Suez Canal.
Why it matters: The pandemic threw a wrench into the gears of a global network that was already struggling with oversized ships and unbalanced product flows. Given how long it takes for the system to recover from any kind of shock, the echoes of the Ever Given disruption are likely to reverberate for months.
The pandemic caused demand for services to plunge while demand for goods — much of which are imported by ship — spiked.
- The sheer quantity of goods moving east across the Pacific already dwarfed exports in the opposite direction, and the pandemic exacerbated that trend.
How it works: Enormous container ships run on schedules that are worked out sometimes years in advance. The industry flourishes in times of predictability, and tends to come unstuck during moments of unpredictable demand.
- Bottlenecks have built up, especially in Southern California, with ships waiting weeks to unload their cargo. Once they're unloaded, they rush out of port quickly to allow a new ship in — so quickly that they often don't have time to reload, leaving potential U.S. exports stranded on domestic shores.
- Because the ships are so large, their maximum speed has been reduced to the point at which they cannot make up for lost time.
The bottom line: A system of small and nimble container ships could have recovered much more easily from the Suez delays. That's not the system we have.
- Expect U.S. retailers to continue to complain about shipping delays on earnings calls for the foreseeable future.
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.