news Operational riskCompliance & regulation Panama Canal Authority
ADVISORIES ARE AVAILABLE AT http://www.pancanal.com FOR ETAS OR DIRECT COMMUNICATION WITH OUR OFFICES, REFER TO NOTICE N-3-2023 Panama Canal Authority Vice Presidency for Operations Advisory To Shipping No. A-17-2025 June 9, 2025 TO: All Shipping Agents, Owners, and Operators SUBJECT: Scheduled Lane Outage at Gatun Locks and Modifications to the Transit Reservation (Booking) System Beginning at 1400 hours on Tuesday, July 1, 2025, until 0100 hours on Friday, July 4, 2025, (59 hours), a dry chamber maintenance will be performed on the East Lane of Gatun Locks. During this period, The West Lane will remain operational, but lockages will take additional time. In accordance with the Transit Reservation (Booking) System regulations, the number of slots available in the Panamax Locks will be reduced to 16 during this maintenance period. Therefore, starting with the 2 nd Period tiebreaker Competition from June 17 to 19, 2025, for booking dates from July 1 to 3, 2025, four (4) booking slots will be offered to supers and no booking slots will be offered to regular vessels. No booking slots will be offered during Booking Period 3 for both supers and regular vessels. The total number of slots available will be 13 for supers and three (3) for regular vessels. The following table shows the reduction of slots in the Panamax Locks for the scheduled maintenance: Category Special Period Period 1 (90 Days) Period 1A (30-15 Days) Period 2 (14-8 Days) Period 3 (Auction) (7-2 Days) Total Supers 3 6 N/A 4 0 13 Regulars 2 1 N/A 0 0 3 Total 5 7 0 4 0 16 Additionally, during the maintenance period, of the total number of slots available to supers, no more than seven (7) may be booked for transit in each direction, and of these, no more than two (2) with daylight restrictions per direction. The combined number of daylight restricted vessels shall not exceed four (4) vessels. Similarly, for regular vessels, no more than two (2) may be booked for transit per direction, and of these, no more than one (1) may be allocated to vessels transiting with restrictions per direction for a total of one (1) vessel with restriction per transit date. Slots allocated during the Special Period and Period 1 for booking dates within the maintenance period will be grandfathered in case they exceed these limitations. Once the maintenance is complete, the 26 slots capacity for the Panamax locks will be reinstated for booking dates beginning July 4, 2025. For any further inquiries regarding these rules, please contact: operationservices@pancanal.com. ORIGINAL SIGNED Boris Moreno Vásquez Vice President for Operations 3654-A (OP-I) V. 29/03/2023
May 4, 2007
Panama Canal Authority
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