The Panama Canal is a forty-mile-long scenic ship canal (51 miles between channel entrances) with six pairs of gravity-fed locks built in a southeast direction across the isthmus of Panama from Colon on the Caribbean to Balboa on the Pacific. Controlling width varies from 100 to 300 feet and minimum depth is 41 feet setting the maximum dimensions of the so-called PANAMAX vessel. Locks raise the canal to a level of approximately 85-ft above sea level. The Atlantic entrance is 27 miles west of the Pacific entrance.
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