WHERE OCEANS MEET
What’s the shortest sea route between New York City and San Francisco?
Through the Panama Canal!
The locks of the Panama Canal let water in or out to raise or lower
ships.
Before the canal was built, ships sailed all the way around South
America to travel between those cities. So the United States built the
canal through the Isthmus of Panama. The canal connects the Atlantic and
Pacific oceans.
When the Panama Canal was first built, most of the ships using it were
not very large. But today, many big ships travel through it. People are
studying the canal to see whether parts of it should be widened so that
large ships can travel more easily.
From the Atlantic Ocean, a ship sails through a channel into a set of
locks. Then water is let into the locks. As the locks fill, the ship is
raised to the same level as the lake that forms the next part of the
canal. The ship sails across the lake into another channel. The locks in
that channel lower the ship to the level of the Pacific Ocean, and the
ship sails on.
