As I recall, it was refloated (or maybe partially refloated) at 4:30 am local time. Probably they want to wait for daylight to inspect things before trying to move it out of the way. In the meantime, they tie it down tight to make sure it doesn’t drift or get blown into a bad position again.
(Just a guess - I am not a salvage engineer)
Reuters says
"Video posted on social media appeared to show the ship’s stern had swung around, opening space in the canal. Other footage, which could not be immediately verified by Reuters, included cheering and ships’ horns sounding in celebration.
Ship-tracking service VesselFinder has changed the ship’s status to under way on its website."
I’m not at all sure it is totally free yet. Many reports seem to be saying “partially” refloated, and my experience says the more cautious reports are more likely to be true.
Having said that, IME, with the stern free it’s highly likely the bow will come free reasonably soon if it hasn’t already. Once you can wiggle the ship, a refloat is usually (not always) imminent.
The bow is still solidly aground, but they have freed the stern and pivoted the ship a little.
Short update video from Prof. Sal Mercogliano:
“Don’t cheer too soon,” Peter Berdowski, CEO of Boskalis, the salvage firm hired to extract the Ever Given, told Dutch NPO Radio 1. “The good news is that the stern is free but we saw that as the simplest part of the job.”
The toughest challenge remained at the front of the ship, he added.
Suez Canal Container Ship Is Partially Freed Ship Stuck in the Suez Canal Is Freed - WSJ
No doubt paylocked. But it says they are hopeful they can free it at high tide, around noon local time.
I don’t think this has been posted yet. At this website you can get live tracking of the Evergiven and see what boats are helping with the salvage. You can watch the various boats move around almost in real time.
VesselFinder does the same. One site may have some info that the other doesn’t, but there’s a big overlap.
Partial freed also means partially stuck. Don’t expect the Egyptian authorities to put anything but a positive spin on the progress of the operation.
Hopefully however they will manage to fully free it very soon.
On the live sites, it looks to me like they’re swinging her stern first one way then the other. Makes sense.
Yeah, but we are already past noon in Egypt, which is when they hoped to have freed the ship, due to high tides.
It looks like it’s off on the live trackers. It’s moving at 2.3 knots straight up the canal.
The BBC is now saying it’s been freed.
Well, some people posting authoritatively in this thread in the last 24 hours were… not correct.
Cite? I don’t recall anyone “authoritatively” posting that it would not be freed now. I see some people advising caution about how soon it might happen, and others pointing out problems with suggested solutions. As it turns out, in this case the caution wasn’t needed and nor were more extreme methods.
Are the towing it out (south) by the stern?
No, they are towing her north. I think that photo must have been taken just after she broke free, before the tow cable at her stern was cast off.
So she did a 180 during this whole event?
ETA - I posted before edit above clarified it.
Your definition of “authoritatively” may vary, of course.