The Panama Canal: The Greatest Engineering Feat in History

"Charles, the Numerically Confusing". Ok, this is a thing now.

Panamanian here. You got the end wrong. The expansion was finished in 2016. The new locks have been fully operational for almost 3 years.

I dunno Simon, the shortcut between my bed and the fridge is pretty amazing.

When I was a teenager, and met up with co-workers and friends at our local Friendly Restaurant for coffee and whatnot before and after work, I met and became friends with an elderly gentleman who worked on both the Panama canal, and the Hoover dam! Al was a real gem of a man. The type of guy that impressionable boys should model their own lives on. I looked up to him, and felt that the entire world lost a great human being when he passed away in 1989. To have participated in 2 of the world's largest engineering/building projects, and lived a long, humble and personable life, there didn't seem anything the man couldn't accomplish, and I'd bet dollars against doughnuts that there aren't but a handful of men living today who could survive the brutal , laborious hours for the pittance in compensation my old friend Al smiled and laughed while explaining his role in either of those projects. People like that amaze me. I wish there were a lot more, because with them, the world would be a much nicer place to live in the 21st century.

A nugget of trivia that always amazes me--the Atlantic end of the canal is actually further West than the Pacific end.

My Army father was stationed in Puerto Rico when the Korean War broke out. He then received orders to Panama CZ. The family sailed via Navy ship and crossed the zone to the Pacific side. He was later transferred to the Atlantic side and again we went via ship through the canal. I was 10 in 1950. He was stationed at Ft Clayton which was very close to the canal. The family lived in quarters at Ft. Kobe. My brother and I attended a missionary school in Balboa and to get there we crossed over the canal daily. We saw many famous ships from WW2 like the USS Battleship Missouri going through the locks. As a child I was totally oblivious to the tensions of our government being there so this video has been very enlightening. Many thanks .

Best video about the history of my country ever on Youtube. It's basically a whole year of History in Panama condensed down to 23 minutes. Loved every second of if and a few very small and not event changing details are missing, for example the Bidlack Treaty is actually named Mallarino-Bidlack.

My dad was one of those army brats who partially grew up in the Panama Canal Zone, and even graduated from the high school there. When I was little, I begged my Dad to get stationed there, so I, too, could explore the jungle, learn to scuba dive, and have a parrot and a monkey as pets. To my childhood self, Panama was a magical place.

As a guy who’s spent nearly 40 years working in mining and construction (As all my family has for generations) can we all please take a moment to appreciate the sacrifices made by the workers on projects like this and the callousness and blatant disregard for human lives from the people in charge. No marvel of engineering is worth such a staggering death toll. It fills my heart with sorrow....

A man a plan a canal Panama. The longest palindrome I was taught as a child :D

Holy shite simon, ive been following your various channels for a while now and i'm also a panamanian citizen so I grew up with this history being taught in school for pretty much all my childhood and lemme tell you that you made it sound way more interesting than any of my previous professors ever did, you definitely have a knack for this! Looking forward for more content!

To their massive credit - the Panamanians not only maintained and kept the canal working great - but they even expanded it massively. Good job Panama!

I was in the US Navy when the Canal changed hands. I was on the last US warship to go through the Canal while under the US flag and also onboard to also be the first to go back through under the Panamanian. It was definitely a unique experience.

[Grant has a nightmare] Subordinate--"Sir, was your nightmare about the untold horrors you say in the civil war or the war with Mexico?" Grant--"No, no, waiting for a train in Panama during rainy season, the true face of horror!"

One of the things they did to get rid of the mosquitoes was to put a layer of oil on all standing water. They basically hired these women to go around with these oil cans just to cover water.

20:39 My high school History teacher was one of those 26,000 troops, and he used to read parts of his journal from his time there during the Veteran's Day assembly each year

"The Path between the Seas: The Creation of the Panama Canal" by David McCullough is a really good book about building the canal.

This dude should be a narrator for Nat Geo or The History Channel, literally within 1 minute of this video I subscribed

I actually just went through the Panama Canal a couple weeks ago through the Old Locks as part of a cruise. Amazing experience and so cool seeing all of the old locks operating still.

Panamanian here! Thanks for teaching some of our history to others! We here are very proud of the canal haha 🇵🇦🇵🇦🇵🇦