Sailing Strait - Page 2© Andrew Willis
Page 2
Jan 17, 2004
Magellan's place in history was secured, even though he wouldn't live to see the first circumnavigation of the globe completed. He was killed in battle on the island of Samar, in the modern Philippines, on April 27th, 1521, in a situation of his own making, both because the battle was unnecessary, and because his officers, seeing a chance to rid themselves of a tyrant, refused to come to his aid. Once he was dead, his officers rescued the survivors, but left Magellan's body where it lay on the beach.
The next group of Europeans wouldn't attempt the Passage until 1536, but today, about 300 ships a year make the passage through the Strait of Magellan and the Chilean Intracoastal Waterway, far fewer than transit the Panama Canal. Time and technology haven't entirely passed this scenic passage by, but the fees paid to the Canal Authority more than make up for the time and fuel that would be lost by most vessels if they were forced still to make the journey south to the land of snow and ice. The US Navy still uses Magellan's Strait, too, although for us now, it's mostly a political exercise, as part of the annual Unitas exercises that we conduct with our South American allies. As a navigator, it's still the most challenging three hundred miles in the world, and I've had the privilege (or maybe curse) to have done it twice in my career. Most sailors can't say they've done it even once. The feeling of it is far different than the technological wonder of the Panama Canal or the bleak and forbidding desert surrounding the Suez Canal. Sailing the Strait is the same as viewing millions of years of natural history. It is as unspoiled as any place on Earth can be, green and white, cold and beautiful and haunting. And to think, I get paid to see places like that.
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