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EQ: How did the Panama Canal improve trade?

EQ: How did the Panama Canal improve trade?. A great engineering project. Took about 10 years Cost $380 million Took 43,000 men to build Shortened a ship’s route 9,000 miles from New York to San Francisco. 1 st time: A French company began in 1882, but gave up 7 years later

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EQ: How did the Panama Canal improve trade?

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  1. EQ: How did the Panama Canal improve trade?

  2. A great engineering project • Took about 10 years • Cost $380 million • Took 43,000 men to build • Shortened a ship’s route 9,000 miles from New York to San Francisco

  3. 1st time: A French company began in 1882, but gave up 7 years later Money & engineering problems existed The big problem was losing 22,000 workers to malaria & yellow fever 2nd Time: The US knew that the canal could not be built without overcoming the disease problem Doctors learned mosquitoes carried the disease, so they told the workers to drain swamps, cover water supplies & tents with nets, & put in new sewers Huge problem!

  4. Why build the canal? • After gaining new territory in the Spanish-American War, America saw the need for a passageway through Central America • President Roosevelt believed that a canal linking the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans could help America’s military and economic interests • In summary: connect the Atlantic & Pacific Oceans. This is important for military and world trade.

  5. How did it help improve trade? • Ships could get their goods from one side of the US to another much faster • The US had clear access to world trade • The US Navy also had clear sailing to defend US interests all over the world

  6. Label your map:

  7. Panama Locks • There are three sets of locks in the canal. A two-step flight at Miraflores, and a single flight at Pedro Miguel, lift ships from the Pacific up to Lake Gatun; then a triple flight at Gatun lowers them to the Atlantic side. All three sets of locks are paired; that is, there are two parallel flights of locks at each of the three lock sites. This allows ships to pass in opposite directions simultaneously; however, large ships cannot cross safely at speed in the Gaillard Cut, so in practice ships pass in one direction for a time, then in the other, using both "lanes" of the locks in one direction at a time.

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