Panama Chaos Grows as US Diesel Shippers Bypass Canal
Cargo ships wait to cross the Panama Canal near Panama City, Panama.
Photographer: Walter Hurtado/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
The worsening bottlenecks at the drought-stricken Panama Canal are pushing at least one US diesel shipper to sail around the tip of South America en route to Chile for the first time since 2020.
The vessel Green Sky is hauling ultra-low sulfur diesel loaded at Citgo Petroleum Corp.’s Clifton Ridge terminal in Louisiana to Valparaiso, Chile, according to Bloomberg vessel tracking and Kpler. Rather than traversing through Panama, the vessel is headed down the eastern coast of South America toward the Strait of Magellan, the first such voyage for a cargo of Gulf Coast diesel since 2020, according to Kpler.