Panama Cruise 2025 Day 12 November 8, Lake

 

After the first locks we sailed through The Culebra Cut, formerly called Gaillard Cut, is an artificial valley that cuts through the Continental Divide in Panama. The cut forms part of the Panama Canal, linking Gatun Lake, and thereby the Atlantic Ocean, to the Gulf of Panama and hence the Pacific Ocean. It is 12.6 kilometres (7.8 mi) from the Pedro Miguel lock on the Pacific side to the Chagres River arm of Lake Gatun.

Culebra is the name for the mountain ridge it cuts through and was also originally applied to the cut itself. From 1915 to 2000 the cut was named Gaillard Cut after US Major David du Bose Gaillard, who had led the excavation. After the canal handover to Panama in 2000, the name was changed back to Culebra. In Spanish the cut is known as the Corte Culebra and is also called the Snake Cut.

Centennial Bridge

 

When the French worked on the canal they excavated some 18,646,000 cu yards of material from the cut and lowered the summit from 210 feet above sea level to 194 feet over a relatively narrow width.

When the US began they used multiple air compressor facilities using some 30 miles of pipe powered hundreds of compressed air drills to bore holes for 400,000 lbs of dynamite per month[ to blast and fragment the rock of the cut so that it could be excavated by steam shovels. Dozens of spoils trains took the spoil from the shovels to the landfill dumps, about 12 miles away. In a typical day, 160 trainloads of material were hauled away.  At the busiest times, there was a train going inbound or outbound almost every minute.

Six thousand men worked in the cut, drilling holes, placing explosives, controlling steam shovels, and running the dirt trains. Twice a day work stopped for blasting, and then the steam shovels were moved in to take the loose spoil (dirt and rock) away. More than 600 holes filled with dynamite were fired daily. In all, 60 million pounds of dynamite were used. .

Steam shovels broke through the Culebra Cut on May 20, 1913. The Americans had lowered the summit of the cut from 194 to 39 ft above sea level, at the same time widening it considerably, and they had excavated over 100 million cubic yards of material.

This is a picture of a number of boats that head out daily on excursions checking out the local wildlife on Monkey Island and various other jungle creatures.

Another Set Pilot Stations

Titan, better known by its former nickname Herman the German, is a large floating crane currently serving in the Panama Canal performing heavy lifts for lock maintenance. Prior to its move to Panama in 1996, the crane was based at the Long Beach Naval Shipyard from the end of World War II until the yard's closure in 1995. It was seized from the German Kriegsmarine following the end of World War II as part of war reparations. The crane served in the Baltic Sea tending German U-boats

Following the closure of the shipyard, the crane was sold to the Panama Canal Commission, and it was transported on the semi-submersible ship Sea Swan in 1996 to the Panama Canal, where it currently serves as the floating crane Titan.

Over the years, "Herman the German" performed numerous notable heavy lifts, including:

Refitting of the battleships USS Missouri and New Jersey in the 1980s

Lifting the Hughes H-4 ("Spruce Goose") from its original hangar in Long Beach when it was relocated to its geodesic dome from 1980 to 1982 for tourist display by the Wrather Corporation