Designer furniture, live animals, oil and gas: Here’s what is stuck in the Suez Canal jam

The cargo ship wedged in the sand and blocking the Suez Canal may be on the other side of the world, but its affects are global.

The shipping expert Lloyd’s List estimates the closure caused by the Ever Given is disrupting more than $9bn (£6.5bn) worth of goods that should be passing through the waterway ever day.

Experts working round-the-clock to free the cargo ship – which has been jammed for five days – have managed to budge its stern and get its rudder and propeller to work again, but it is still wedged in the sand.

Here’s some of what is currently stuck in the marine highway jam behind it:

• The UK-based Cotswold Company has £1.7m of furniture in about 100 containers currently stuck

• At least 20 of the boats delayed are carrying livestock, according to marine tracking data, raising concerns about the welfare of the animals if the logjam drags on

• The canal is particularly crucial for the transport of oil and its closure is affecting oil and gas shipments to Europe from the Middle East. Crude oil markets have already seen a roughly 3% increase in the price per barrel in reaction to the blockage

• Syria’s Oil Ministry has begun rationing the distribution of fuel in the war-torn country due to delays of shipments behind the Ever Given

• The liquid natural gas carrier Pan Americas changed course in the mid-Atlantic and is now aiming south to go around the southern tip of Africa, according to satellite data from MarineTraffic.com, but supplies will be delayed

• Supplies of cereal. More than 54.1 million tonnes of cereal passed through in 2019. Several containments are currently in the jam

• It is also believed the blockage will delay a range of parts and raw materials for European products such as cotton from India for clothes, petroleum from the Middle East for plastics, and auto parts from China

The Ever Given is 400m-long (1,300ft – as long as the Empire State Building is high), and 200,000 tonnes.

It ran aground on Tuesday morning amid high winds and a sandstorm that affected visibility.

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