Drought cut Panama Canal transits by a fifth in 2024
Total ships through the Panama Canal per fiscal year (Oct–Sep), FY2019–FY2026.
- 1. Heat that bleaches coral reached 84% of the world's reefs
- 2. Swiss glaciers lost over 5% of their ice in 2026
- 3. Canada's 2023 fires burned more than twice the old record
- 4. Tropical forests lost a record 6.7 million hectares in 2024
- 5. Drought cut Panama Canal transits by a fifth in 2024
- 6. China adds more forest each year than any other country
- 7. Kyoto's cherry blossoms now peak earliest in 1,200 years
- 8. Brazil's Amazon lost the least forest on record
- 9. Three in four Bangkok residents now live on a floodplain
Transits fell from 14,080 in FY2023 to 11,240 in FY2024 as Gatun Lake ran low.
October 2023 rainfall in the canal watershed, the lowest October since 1950.
Daily slots were cut again in September 2026 as El Niño rains fell short.
the numbers & method
| Year | Total transits |
|---|---|
| 2019 | 13,785 |
| 2020 | 13,369 |
| 2021 | 13,342 |
| 2022 | 14,239 |
| 2023 | 14,080 |
| 2024 | 11,240 |
| 2025 | 13,404 |
| 2026 | 13,951 |
Claim types Fact
Total transits = oceangoing plus small vessels. FY2019–FY2020: ACP Annual Report 2020; FY2021–FY2023: ACP traffic table; FY2024–FY2025: ACP FY2025 release; FY2026 (preliminary): ACP via DataPortuaria, Oct 2026. Some press quoted 9,944 for FY2024, which counts only Panamax and Neopanamax lock transits on a different basis. Rainfall and slot cuts: ACP via Professional Mariner (Nov 2023) and DataPortuaria (Oct 2026). Normal capacity before the drought was 38–40 slots a day.
Published 31 Oct 2026
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