WEBVTT - Why Is the Panama Canal a Modern Wonder of the World? 0:00:01.880 --> 0:00:08.320 Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio, Hey Brainstuff, Lauren Bohlbaum. 0:00:08.440 --> 0:00:13.480 Here in the hot jungles of Central America in the 0:00:13.520 --> 0:00:17.000 early nineteen hundreds, but thousands of workers toiled in the 0:00:17.079 --> 0:00:20.479 rain and mud trying to cleave Panama in half in 0:00:20.600 --> 0:00:23.799 order to join the Caribbean Sea to the Pacific Ocean. 0:00:24.800 --> 0:00:28.520 The difficult, dirty work involved more than digging and dynamiting, 0:00:28.560 --> 0:00:31.920 though working on the Panama Canal in the early days 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:37.760 was about simply surviving. Thousands of workers Perhaps his money 0:00:37.800 --> 0:00:40.880 is twenty two thousand died while the French first tried 0:00:40.880 --> 0:00:44.880 to dig the canal. Yellow fever was rampant, as was malaria. 0:00:45.479 --> 0:00:48.840 On the job accidents killed and maimed. Close to eighty 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:51.919 percent of the workforce was fleeing what Americans took over 0:00:51.960 --> 0:00:56.920 the job in nineteen oh three. When famed engineer John 0:00:56.960 --> 0:01:00.760 Frank Stevens arrived in nineteen oh five, First's job was 0:01:00.800 --> 0:01:04.640 to stop the carnage, and that meant accepting the new 0:01:04.680 --> 0:01:08.320 idea that controlling mosquitoes would prevent the spread of disease. 0:01:09.160 --> 0:01:11.080 We talked about this a bit in our recent episode 0:01:11.080 --> 0:01:15.360 about Hispanic scientists who changed the world Carlos Juan Finlay 0:01:15.520 --> 0:01:18.479 had been saying since the eighteen eighties that mosquitoes were 0:01:18.480 --> 0:01:21.600 the carrier of yellow fever, but this theory was only 0:01:21.840 --> 0:01:24.360 just then around the turn of the century. Catching on 0:01:26.280 --> 0:01:28.720 for the article this episode is based on how Stuff Work. 0:01:28.760 --> 0:01:32.200 Spoke with Jay David Rogers, a professor of geological engineering 0:01:32.240 --> 0:01:36.800 at Missouri University of Science and Technology. He said, men 0:01:36.840 --> 0:01:39.720 of that era couldn't conceive of a mosquito being able 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:42.760 to kill a strong man. They just couldn't respect that. 0:01:43.480 --> 0:01:45.880 The thing you had to conquer to make that project 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:50.760 work was the sanitation issues. Under the guidance of US 0:01:50.880 --> 0:01:55.200 Army physician William Crawford Gorges, Stevens had the local swamplands 0:01:55.280 --> 0:02:00.680 drained and grassland's cut to control the mosquitoes. They employed inicides, 0:02:00.920 --> 0:02:05.280 screened in workers quarters, and trapped adult mosquitos wherever they could. 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:10.000 The workers were given quinine and anti malarial. The result, 0:02:10.480 --> 0:02:13.560 yellow fever in the area was all but eradicated, and 0:02:13.680 --> 0:02:16.680 deaths from malaria in the local population were reduced by 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:22.040 over eighty percent. The Panama Canal is considered a marvel 0:02:22.040 --> 0:02:25.400 of engineering, one of the seven Modern Wonders of the world. 0:02:26.040 --> 0:02:30.080 But it's debatable whether these medical feats were even more impressive. 0:02:32.280 --> 0:02:35.280 But okay, let's back up a bit. Oh, why were 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:37.440 we going to all this trouble in the first place. 0:02:38.880 --> 0:02:42.520 Egypt's sUAS Canal, connecting the Red Sea to the Mediterranean 0:02:42.680 --> 0:02:46.560 had opened in eighteen sixty nine, revolutionizing water travel from 0:02:46.600 --> 0:02:51.120 Europe to Asia. After seeing this success, America envisioned a 0:02:51.160 --> 0:02:54.040 shortcut through Central America as a way of strengthening its 0:02:54.080 --> 0:02:58.760 global position. Before the Panama Canal opened, the ships had 0:02:58.800 --> 0:03:01.079 to travel all the way around South America to get 0:03:01.120 --> 0:03:04.760 from the US's Atlantic coast to its Pacific coast. At 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:07.360 the time, the trip took over sixty days and some 0:03:07.560 --> 0:03:11.240 eight thousand miles. That's nearly thirteen thousand kilometers of travel, 0:03:12.040 --> 0:03:15.120 not ideal if you wanted to move goods or naval 0:03:15.160 --> 0:03:19.240 ships in any kind of a hurry. For years, the 0:03:19.360 --> 0:03:22.720 US had been considering building a canal through Nicaragua, but 0:03:22.919 --> 0:03:26.720 engineering concerns, not to mention worries about active volcanoes in 0:03:26.720 --> 0:03:30.480 the area prompted President Teddy Roosevelt to continue with the 0:03:30.560 --> 0:03:35.200 failed French site in Panama instead. In nineteen oh three, 0:03:35.240 --> 0:03:37.680 he agreed to pay the French forty million dollars to 0:03:37.720 --> 0:03:40.960 assume control of the project, worth the equivalent of about 0:03:40.960 --> 0:03:44.880 one point three billion in today's dollars. It'd take more 0:03:44.920 --> 0:03:48.600 than a decade to complete. The French had helped build 0:03:48.600 --> 0:03:51.520 the Suez Canal in Egypt, but the Panama project was 0:03:51.560 --> 0:03:56.560 a different animal, immense and complex. As the Americans took control, 0:03:56.800 --> 0:03:59.960 the building of the Panama Canal became an audacious example 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:03.840 of American ingenuity and know how and a loose sense 0:04:03.880 --> 0:04:07.720 of physical responsibility. By the end, the US had shelled 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:11.160 out some three hundred and seventy five million dollars, somewhere 0:04:11.160 --> 0:04:15.080 close to eleven billion today. The project came in at 0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:19.320 about four hundred and forty four percent over budget. Rogers 0:04:19.360 --> 0:04:22.800 said it was a national pride project. We'd just kept 0:04:22.839 --> 0:04:28.640 writing checks. Besides the deadly diseases that plagued the early 0:04:28.720 --> 0:04:31.640 days of the construction, there was also difficult weather to 0:04:31.680 --> 0:04:35.920 contend with tropical rains and intense heat, and there were 0:04:36.000 --> 0:04:38.840 political troubles as the United States cleared the way for 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:42.440 the canal by deeply interfering with local governments in order 0:04:42.520 --> 0:04:46.480 to help Panama, then a province of Columbia, officially separate 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:50.880 and become its own country. Newly sovereign Panama was willing 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:53.800 to seed the necessary land of the US where Columbia 0:04:53.839 --> 0:05:01.520 had balked. And we haven't even really talked about engineering yet, okay. 0:05:02.000 --> 0:05:05.520 American engineers abandoned ideas about a sea level canal like 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:09.640 the Suez. Director Stephens instead insisted upon a series of 0:05:09.760 --> 0:05:13.520 locks that would raise or lower ships as needed. But 0:05:13.760 --> 0:05:19.559 that designed necessitated construction of another big project. A dam 0:05:19.640 --> 0:05:22.960 had to be built across the sometimes raging Shagris River 0:05:23.320 --> 0:05:26.000 to ensure the proper flow of water between the Pacific 0:05:26.000 --> 0:05:30.680 Ocean and the Atlantic. Called the Gottune Dam, it was 0:05:30.800 --> 0:05:33.839 at the time the largest dam in the world. It 0:05:33.880 --> 0:05:37.640 also formed Gatune Lake, a major component of the canal's operation. 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:41.760 More on that in a minute. And then there was 0:05:41.800 --> 0:05:44.839 the sheer scope of the project. Between the French and 0:05:44.920 --> 0:05:49.160 American builders, Some seven point two billion cubic feet of 0:05:49.240 --> 0:05:51.880 earth and rock had to be excavated two hundred and 0:05:51.920 --> 0:05:55.400 seventy million cubic meters, which is three times what was 0:05:55.440 --> 0:05:59.200 removed to build the Suez Canal. Most of that muck 0:05:59.360 --> 0:06:02.080 was placed on to railcars and shipped to the coasts, 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:05.680 dumped into huge piles in the ocean. It now forms 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:09.119 breakwaters and the foundation for towns and a military base, 0:06:09.760 --> 0:06:14.159 and much was also dumped into the adjacent jungle. Rogers 0:06:14.240 --> 0:06:16.400 said they had to learn a lot while they were going. 0:06:16.880 --> 0:06:19.680 They used up all of the vitrified clay pipes to 0:06:19.720 --> 0:06:22.120 be produced in the United States, and all the cement 0:06:22.200 --> 0:06:24.640 produced in the United States, and all of the dynamite 0:06:24.640 --> 0:06:27.799 produced in the United States over this ten year period 0:06:28.200 --> 0:06:34.640 all diverted down to Panama. Yet despite the constant challenges, 0:06:34.839 --> 0:06:38.520 the Panama Canal opened in August of nineteen fourteen, spanning 0:06:38.600 --> 0:06:43.520 some fifty miles or eighty kilometers through the land. In 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:46.400 its first five years, the canal was barely used due 0:06:46.440 --> 0:06:49.400 to decreased commercial traffic because of World War One and 0:06:49.520 --> 0:06:52.719 a series of landslides which closed the passage for almost 0:06:52.760 --> 0:06:56.279 all of nineteen fifteen and would continue for years. The 0:06:56.360 --> 0:06:58.680 different layers of earth and rock that made up the 0:06:58.760 --> 0:07:04.120 land interacted on predictably due to all that excavation, But 0:07:04.360 --> 0:07:07.520 by World War Two, the Panama Canal was traveled extensively 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:11.000 by US warships and it's become a major shipping route 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:16.880 between the Pacific and Atlantic. At one time, engineers again 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:19.640 looked at making the passage a sea level canal, which 0:07:19.640 --> 0:07:22.679 would eliminate the need for locks and decrease travel time. 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:27.440 That idea was scrapped, and after World War II, when 0:07:27.520 --> 0:07:31.320 military ships became too big to pass through, engineers also 0:07:31.400 --> 0:07:35.720 considered detonating a series of underground nuclear devices to excavate 0:07:35.840 --> 0:07:40.160 more earth and expand the canal. That too, was dismissed. 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:44.960 In nineteen seventy seven, the signing of the Turi Host 0:07:45.000 --> 0:07:47.880 Carter Treaties returned control of the canal from the United 0:07:47.920 --> 0:07:51.880 States to Panama, effective December thirty first of nineteen ninety nine. 0:07:53.040 --> 0:07:55.720 Since then, the Panama Canal has been expanded so that 0:07:55.960 --> 0:07:59.280 even larger aircraft, carriers and cargo ships can pass through. 0:08:00.080 --> 0:08:02.120 The locks used to be about one hundred feet or 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:04.800 thirty meters wide, and are now at about one hundred 0:08:04.800 --> 0:08:08.960 and seventy five feet or fifty meters. Even so, there 0:08:09.000 --> 0:08:14.120 are now some ships too big for the canal. But 0:08:14.480 --> 0:08:18.160 let's talk about how the locks work. The Pacific Ocean 0:08:18.200 --> 0:08:20.960 sits at a slightly higher sea level than the Atlantic, 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:24.120 and the rocky land in between the two through Panama 0:08:24.280 --> 0:08:26.640 rises to some three hundred and sixty feet or one 0:08:26.720 --> 0:08:31.000 hundred and ten meters above both. Rather than excavating down 0:08:31.040 --> 0:08:34.040 to the same sea level and letting the waters rip through, 0:08:34.800 --> 0:08:38.720 engineers determined that a series of massive locking gates could 0:08:38.800 --> 0:08:43.280 lower and raise ships. That's where our human made Gatun 0:08:43.400 --> 0:08:46.319 Lake comes in, which risks at about eighty five feet 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:50.560 above sea level that's twenty six meters from either side. 0:08:50.760 --> 0:08:53.520 Once a ship enters the Panama Canal, the goal is 0:08:53.559 --> 0:08:56.560 to get them up and over the terrain across Gattun 0:08:56.640 --> 0:08:59.720 Lake and then back down again, which is the job 0:08:59.760 --> 0:09:06.160 of locking system. A ship's entering the Panama Canal from 0:09:06.160 --> 0:09:09.920 the Atlantic enter the first of three Gatoon locks, where 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:13.760 a massive chamber fills twenty six point seven million gallons 0:09:13.800 --> 0:09:17.280 of water. To fill the chamber with water and raise 0:09:17.320 --> 0:09:20.440 the ship, the gates and lower lock valves are closed 0:09:20.600 --> 0:09:24.439 while the upper valves are opened. Water from Gatoon Lake 0:09:24.559 --> 0:09:28.000 rushes in through twenty holes in the chamber floor. It 0:09:28.080 --> 0:09:30.720 takes about eight minutes for the chamber to completely fill 0:09:30.880 --> 0:09:34.200 and raise the ship. The process is repeated two more 0:09:34.240 --> 0:09:38.200 times until the ship is level with Gatoon Lake. The 0:09:38.240 --> 0:09:41.040 ship then travels across Gatoon Lake until it reaches the 0:09:41.040 --> 0:09:44.640 Pacific Ocean side, where it enters the Pedromaguel locks and 0:09:44.720 --> 0:09:48.080 the process goes in reverse. It's lowered through one lock 0:09:48.160 --> 0:09:51.520 down to a second human made lake Miraflorus, then through 0:09:51.520 --> 0:09:54.920 a second lock back to sea level. The entire trip 0:09:55.040 --> 0:09:59.920 takes an average of eight to ten hours. Ships don't 0:10:00.000 --> 0:10:02.280 so through the Panama Canal for free. They pay a 0:10:02.320 --> 0:10:04.559 toll based on the measurements of the vessel each time 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:07.480 they enter, and it earns Panama more than two point 0:10:07.520 --> 0:10:11.240 five billion dollars a year. There are now three lanes 0:10:11.280 --> 0:10:14.000 for ships and locks, so it's not a single file 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:18.600 line going through. That means that there are forty six 0:10:18.800 --> 0:10:22.840 locking gates in total, and they're each massive of sixty 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:26.320 five feet wide by seven feet deep in metric that's 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:30.240 nine by two meters. Their heights vary from forty five 0:10:30.280 --> 0:10:33.320 to eighty feet of fourteen to twenty four meters. The 0:10:33.360 --> 0:10:36.240 mere Floris gates are the tallest because of the Pacific 0:10:36.280 --> 0:10:40.640 Ocean tides. Each gate weighs from three hundred and twenty 0:10:40.679 --> 0:10:45.520 to six hundred metric tons. The canal hosts nearly fourteen 0:10:45.559 --> 0:10:48.959 thousand trips a year, mainly by container ships and others 0:10:49.040 --> 0:10:53.640 carrying fuel, coal, grains, minerals and metals. Though other smaller 0:10:53.679 --> 0:10:58.400 ships make the Crossing two. Now more than one hundred 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:01.400 years after its opening, you can see why it remains 0:11:01.559 --> 0:11:09.040 a modern wonderer. Today's episode is based on the article 0:11:09.240 --> 0:11:12.880 how the Panama Canal makes waterflow uphill on HowStuffWorks dot Com, 0:11:12.920 --> 0:11:15.839 written by John Donovan. Brain Stuff is production by Heart 0:11:15.920 --> 0:11:18.480 Radio in partnership with HowStuffWorks dot Com, and it's produced 0:11:18.480 --> 0:11:21.560 by Tyler Klang. Before more podcasts from my heart Radio, 0:11:21.800 --> 0:11:24.959 visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen 0:11:25.000 --> 0:11:26.000 to your favorite shows