Panama Canal Averts Shipping Crisis With Water Plan — and Luck

The Panama Canal has managed to ward off a shipping crisis that threatened to upend $270 billion a year in global trade. It did so with careful water management — and a little bit of luck.

As parched conditions gripped the Central American country last year, the Panama Canal Authority slashed the number of vessels allowed to cross each day to 22, about 60% of normal. Shippers paid millions of dollars to jump the growing queue and avoid wait times that stretched more than two weeks.

But recently, with water levels rising, the authority has started to raise the limit. ...