A dry disaster

In trouble: Dock workers on a small row boat pulling a rope between the dock and vehicle carrier Sirius Leader as it prepares to enter the Miraflores locks while transiting the Panama Canal last September. With water levels low, shipping is backed up for months. — Tribune News Service

THE vestiges of an ancient forest tell the story of just how bad things are at the drought-stricken Panama Canal in Central America.

A few hundred feet from the massive tankers hauling goods across the globe, gaunt tree stumps rise above the waterline. They’re all that remains of a woodland flooded more than a century ago to create the canal. It’s not unusual to see them at the height of the dry season – but now, in the immediate aftermath of what’s usually the rainy period, they should be fully submerged.