Asking the source…
Asking the source…
How many ships pass a few narrow sea passages now, against the same week a year earlier. The atlas cannot yet say which minerals travel through them.
Scroll, or use the step links. The map follows the step in the middle of the screen. Nothing plays by itself.
Step 1 of 5
IMF PortWatch counts the ships that pass maritime chokepoints each day. The atlas averages the seven days up to the latest day in the source and compares them with the same seven weekdays a year earlier.
In the latest window, the passage with the most transits is Malacca Strait: 235.9 a day in the seven days to 8 November 2026.
The figures are read from the source when this page is made, and refreshed about twice a day. They are shown here only and are not part of the atlas's downloads. The globe turns to each passage; it draws no ships.
Step 2 of 5
235.9 transits a day in the seven days to 8 November 2026. A year earlier: 241.7. Change: −2.4 %.
Step 3 of 5
Suez Canal: 44.4 transits a day in the seven days to 8 November 2026, against 44.1 a year earlier (+0.6 %).
Bab el-Mandeb Strait: 26.3 a day in the seven days to 8 November 2026, against 40.1 a year earlier (−34.5 %).
Step 4 of 5
77.9 transits a day in the seven days to 8 November 2026. A year earlier: 85. Change: −8.4 %.
↑ Back: Suez Canal and Bab el-Mandeb↓ Next: The missing link
Step 5 of 5where the data ends
The atlas has no record of which minerals pass through which chokepoint. Its trade data name the exporting and the importing country, not the route a cargo took.
So this story cannot say how much cobalt, copper or lithium depends on any of these passages, and it does not.
Closing the gap needs trade flows matched to shipping routes, from a source that may be reused. The atlas has none yet.