PANAMA CANAL
 
A great water tollway, often called the "Big Ditch," links the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. It weaves across a strip of tropical land where the Isthmus of Panama narrows in the shape of a long flattened letter S. The fame of the Panama Canal is not in its size, for it is only about 51 miles long. The Big Ditch is an engineering triumph over nature. It has also been a major influence on world trade.
 
What the Canal Has Accomplished What the Canal Has Accomplished

About 32 oceangoing vessels pass through the canal daily. They pay an average of $28,000 for passage. Some massive ships pay tolls several times this amount. The fees are well spent, for the trip of some eight to ten hours through the canal saves many miles and many days of travel. If there were no Panama Canal, a ship going from San Francisco, Calif., to New York City would have to sail down around the tip of South America, an additional 7,900 nautical miles some of it in very rough seas. Refrigerated cargo ships from Australia use the Panama Canal as a shortcut in voyages to Great Lakes ports, via the St. Lawrence Seaway.

An almost endless variety of commodities passes through the canal day after day. About 140 million tons of oceangoing commercial cargo are shipped through the canal in a single year. The main commodity group petroleum and petroleum products makes up about 22 percent of the annual cargo tonnage; grains compose about 16 percent. A significant development in canal cargo has been the increase in automobile trade. Over 2.4 million tons of automobiles are moved through the canal every year.
 
Heavy Ship Traffic Brings Problems Heavy Ship Traffic Brings Problems

In operating the Panama Canal there are never-ending problems. Some are similar to those of land highways. Increasing traffic has required widening the lanes. "Street lights" have been put in for night safety. One-way traffic is necessary at times. Modern traffic control systems have been installed.

The comparison with land travel, however, has limits. The Panama Canal, because of its location, size, and type of construction, has problems unlike those of any other transportation link in the world.
 
How the Canal Handles Ship Traffic How the Canal Handles Ship Traffic

The locks of most canals elsewhere in the world are used for a single purpose either to move ships up to a higher body of water or to move them down to a lower body. The Panama locks, however, literally take ships up the side of a hill and down again. From the air the locks look like giant steps. They are built in pairs for two-way traffic or, occasionally, parallel traffic in the same direction.

A transit, or passage of a ship through the canal, is planned carefully. While it is still far out at sea, an approaching vessel, depending upon its position, radios either the office of the port captain in Cristobal, on the Atlantic side, or in Balboa, on the Pacific side. Marine traffic control centers prepare transit plans. The rule of "first come, first served" cannot always be followed. Some ships are so large they must be classed as clear cuts. This means that the canal, particularly through twisting Gaillard Cut, has to be cleared of oncoming ships. Then for a definite time certain sections are open only to one-way traffic.

A daylight clear cut is a ship which can proceed safely only in the daytime in a one-way channel. Not only large ships, but any vessel with dangerous cargo falls into this class. Fluorescent lighting has been installed in some canal stretches to permit more traffic to move at night. The locks division chief keeps the control centers posted on any event which might change the transit scheduling. The movement of a ship through a lock is called a lockage. Sometimes more than one vessel moves through a lock at the same time. This is called a tandem lockage.
 
Into the Lock Chamber Into the Lock Chamber

A ship from the Atlantic side enters the first Gatun lock chamber at sea level. Huge miter gates close behind. The gates are seven feet thick, with compartments of concrete. The largest of the Panama Canal gates, at Miraflores, weigh some 730 tons. They are 82 feet high, as tall as a six-story building. Despite their size the gates are delicately balanced on their pintles. A 25-horsepower motor can swing them. A fender chain is raised to protect the gates against damage by a ship. Each chain weighs more than 15 tons. Each link alone weighs 70 pounds. The chains are hydraulically controlled. If they are struck by a ship, the fender chains yield to lessen the blow.

A lockmaster walks on the wall beside the ship. Only on his order are the locks opened or closed or the water level changed. He uses hand signals or a telephone to give orders to the control house operator. In the control house the operator watches indicators arranged on a miniature set of locks. When he presses a switch to open a pair of the giant lock gates outside, a pair of tiny gates on the control table duplicates the action. Indicators show the degree of opening of the water valves and the height of the water in each lock chamber.
 
HISTORY OF CANAL CONSTRUCTION
 
A sea-level canal is not a new idea. It was considered when interest in a canal developed in the 16th century. In 1534 King Charles I of Spain ordered a survey to determine the possibility of a canal in the Panama region. He abandoned his plans when the Spanish governor there made an unfavorable report.

Balboa had discovered the Pacific in 1513. He sighted the vast ocean from a peak some miles southeast of the eventual Panama Canal location. The Pacific port of the canal, Balboa, was named in his honor.

For years the Spaniards searched in vain for a natural waterway joining the two oceans. Eventually they brought their gold and silver from Peru and other South American colonies to Panama City on the Pacific side. Mule trains carried the treasure through narrow trails to Portobello or Nombre de Dios on the Caribbean. Ships there loaded the cargo for shipment to Spain. Pirates frequently raided Panama.
 
French Attempt Ends in Failure French Attempt Ends in Failure

Actual construction of a sea-level canal was begun in 1882 by a French company under Ferdinand de Lesseps. He had completed the Suez Canal in 1869. By comparison, however, building the Suez Canal had been simple. Mismanagement, dishonesty, and terrible epidemics of disease in Panama forced the French company into bankruptcy in 1889. During seven years of digging, 22,000 men had died of tropical diseases. This was equivalent to wiping out the entire construction crew twice, for the total number of men employed at any one time did not average more than 10,000.

The French canal builders did not know that the deadly malaria and yellow fever were caused by bites of certain mosquitoes. Serious errors were made in sanitation. French physicians were said to have ordered the legs of hospital beds placed in water to keep ants and other crawling bugs from the patients. The water became an additional breeding place for mosquitoes, which already were swarming in from marshes, streams, and pools in the hot, rainy region.
 
American Engineers Take On Project American Engineers Take On Project

Credit goes to two United States Army colonels for succeeding where the French had failed. Colonel George Washington Goethals, as engineer in chief after 1907, directed construction. Colonel William Crawford Gorgas of the Medical Corps, as chief sanitary officer, led the battle against disease. Later both men became major generals.
 
Gorgas Conquers the Mosquito Gorgas Conquers the Mosquito

Two medical discoveries had been made that prepared the way for the achievement of Colonel Gorgas. In 1898 Dr. Ronald Ross, an English army surgeon, had discovered that malaria is transmitted by the bite of the Anopheles mosquito. In 1901 Dr. Walter Reed, a surgeon in the United States Army, and his associates had proved that yellow fever is passed from man to man by the Aedes mosquito. Gorgas himself, while serving as chief sanitary officer in Havana, Cuba, had directed the development of practical methods of sanitation based on these discoveries. With this invaluable knowledge and experience as a guide, he set to work to make the Canal Zone a safe place for men to work, live, and raise their families.

He drained every lake, swamp, pond, and ditch that could be emptied. Over those that could not be drained, he spread a film of oil to destroy mosquito eggs and larvae. He cut grass jungles to the ground, destroyed vermin, and burned rubbish. He raised all buildings above the ground and screened windows, doors, and porches. He ordered householders to cover every vessel that held water.

All railway cars were screened, and a hospital car was added to every train. Hospitals were built for isolation and treatment. Cities were given sewers and pure water. Ships coming from disease-ridden areas were placed under strict quarantine. To guard against bubonic plague, rats and fleas were killed and houses made ratproof.

Gorgas began his work in May 1904. In May 1906 the last case of yellow fever occurred in Panama. The conquest of malaria was slower, but the number of cases dropped year by year. By 1914, when the canal was opened, only 82 out of each 1,000 employees were hospitalized with malaria. During 1914 only seven employees died of the disease. With an average of 39,000 employees during the ten years of construction, the deaths from all causes averaged only 663 each year. This death rate of 17 per 1,000 was lower than the rate in many United States cities during the same period.

When he first went to Panama, Gorgas called it the most unhealthful place in the world. Today the former Canal Zone is said to be one of the world's healthiest places. Few disease-carrying or pest insects are now found in the area. Here was one of the most impressive victories ever won by science against disease, and the cost of all the sanitary measures involved was about a penny a day for each inhabitant.
 
The Canal Finally Is Completed The Canal Finally Is Completed

On October 10, 1913, President Woodrow Wilson, 4,000 miles away in the White House in Washington, D.C., pressed an electric button. The impulse sent a flash over cables to set off a charge of dynamite. This blew out a temporary dike. A flood of water rushed through a rock-walled rift in the mountains, and the Panama Canal was a dream realized.

The Canal Zone marked the historic day by placing a new motto on its official seal: "A Land Divided, the World United." On August 15, 1914, the canal was opened to world commerce. The first ship through was the vessel Ancon, carrying guests of honor. After 400 years, the first explorers' dream of a westward passage had come true.
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