Not so friendly Canal

SAIL has received a number of communications from Craig Owings of the Pedro Miguel Boat Club, on the Panama Canal. While this letter reflects only one side of the story, it speaks to long-term trends at the Canal, where yacht-transit costs have been rising and the welcome has become less warm as the new operators of the ditch work our their profit model. We pick up inside a recent mailing from Mr. Owings, opening with a comment about Alberto Aleman Zubieta, the Administrator of the Authoridad del Canal de Panama (ACP).

Mr. Aleman Zubieta is the person who stated in the US Government public hearings of 1998 on increase of tolls for yachts in the Panama Canal (he was then the Panama Canal Commission Administrator), that the canal could never charge the full cost of transiting to a yacht, and in fact the yachts distracted from the business of transiting ships through the canal. To this distraction it was inferred that if the yachts went away that would be fine, but as long as the canal was required to transit the yachts under the Panama Canal Neutrality Treaty, they would.

When Panama formed the ACP, the ACP was made a "for profit" operation of the Panamanian Government. The decision was made to make each user of the Panama Canal pay the actual "usage" costs (cost based accounting). To this end the ACP has used "administrative" fee increases that are applied to the yachts for their cost of transit .... this causes the actual payment goes up, but the "transit toll" stays the same. The ACP is using administrative fess, initiating some and increasing others, to increase their income without increasing actual "transit tolls". The bottom line is that it costs lots more than the "transit fee" listed in the Marine Tariffs of the Panama Canal to actually cross the Panama Canal.

The total number of yacht facilities in the canal area has increased by one to date. This is a very nice facility, but limited in the number of vessels that it can accommodate, and other projected marinas are just paper dreams to date.

In Panama, the three major canal-area yacht clubs are the Balboa Yacht Club, the Pedro Miguel Boat Club, and the Panama Canal Yacht Club. The Balboa Yacht Club is a mooring field at the side of the Pacific approaches to the canal; the Panama Canal Yacht Club is in the Caribbean entrance to the canal; and Pedro Miguel Boat Club is in the canal.

The Panama Canal Yacht Club is struggling under the burden of an almost $7000 per month "rent" payment to the concessionaire of the port area of Cristobal. Tthe Balboa Yacht Club is fighting for recognition of its rights to the land portion of its facility that was taken from it after the implementation of the Panama Canal Treaty, and there is an attempt by the ACP to force the Pedro Miguel Boat Club out of existence.

The ACP has determined that after 65 years the PMBC is a "threat" to the operation of the Panama Canal and wants the PMBC to vacate its facility in the Miraflores Lake, between the Miraflores Locks and the Pedro Miguel Locks.

Mr. Zubieta has been repeatedly asked to start a dialog to identify a new site in the Panama Canal for the PMBC, or to compensate for the improvements of the PMBC, so that the PMBC might relocate to another location outside the Panama Canal operating area.

To this day the Administrator of the ACP refuses to discuss the issues. In fact he has caused the ACP to attempt an eviction of the boat club as "intruders" and has ordered the canal to not transit yachts to the PMBC in an effort to force the PMBC to close its facility for lack of membership access and by economic strangulation. The PMBC is the only extended maintenance facility in Panama that is not a commercial shipyard. The other clubs have haul out facilities, but there is nowhere else to haul a boat for major long term repairs or for safe long term dry storage of a vessel.

In reality the quality of the facilities for cruising sailors at the Panama Canal are eroding. If the "projects" are completed for the new marinas, there will be plenty of gold plate facilities for the mega yachts and the rich, but the common sailor/cruiser will find slim, expensive pickings when they come to Panama to transit the Panama Canal.

As for the ACP's transit operation of yachts there are many factors that now come into play, and issues that could be addressed to relieve the "stress" on the money making business of the Panama Canal while still allowing yachts inexpensive, safe transit of the Panama Canal as a public service. Over the years the yachting community of Panama has requested the implementation of a yachting advisory council to the Panama Canal, similar to the one established for commercial shipping interests; to date the requests have been ignored by the canal.

The issue of night transits has been addressed repeatedly to the Panama Canal organization. There is no absolute restriction by regulation on night transit of vessels, and the night is the most underutilized canal operation time, but the ACP does not allow it, citing "security & safety" issues. Those issues are not enumerated directly, nor are solutions sought for those perceived problems.

Rafting of vessels is used to get more yachts through the canal in the available daylight transit slots, but the majority of yachts damaged in transiting the canal are in raft-ups. Yacht fittings and construction is just not designed to take the loadings imposed on them by the weight of 2 or 3 vessels hanging on the sides of each other; yacht scantlings are designed to carry the loads of the vessel, not multiple vessels.

The new Panamanian "Organic Law" forming the Authoridad del Canal de Panama, allows damaged vessels to claim for those damages only through an administrative system of the same ACP; appeals may be made only to the Maritime Court of Panama. What happened to the rights of a vessel to adjudicate in its home country, or the country of its owners, as is common in international maritime law?

Again the ACP is restricting the options of the yachting community. If you have a problem with the ACP and they determine that you have violated their operating and safety rules, they can assess fines to $1,000,000 administratively, depending on their decision of the severity of offence . . . and the adjudication and appeal process is completely within (restricted to) their organization or the Maritime Court of Panama. If you accept their "fine" without complaint, the will reduce it by 30%. However if you protest the fine reduction evaporates.

The bottom line is that the Panama Canal is no longer the yacht friendly place it once was. You cannot depend on the legal system of the United States Government, or other governments.

Until there is another way to "round-the-horn" at the equator, the canal is a requirement for most yachts moving from ocean to ocean. Use it, but do so understanding the risks, and know that the rules and responsibilities are not as they were. Yachts are truly second class users of the Panama Canal.

Craig Owings
Commodore, Pedro Miguel Boat Club

To learn more, and to provide help, visit Pedro Miguel Boat Club

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