How a Container Ship Crosses the Ocean

Where did your sneakers, toys and bike come from? Many of them crossed an ocean!

A giant container ship carries thousands of big steel boxes across the sea. This book follows one red container from the factory all the way to a store near you, and opens up the ship and the port, part by part.

Big cutaway diagrams show:

• why a steel ship floats, and how ballast water keeps it level and upright
• how giant cranes, straddle carriers and twistlocks load and lock down thousands of boxes
• how one of the biggest engines in the world turns the propeller, with no gearbox at all
• how the rudder, the bow thruster and the round bulbous bow help a giant ship steer and save fuel
• how canal locks lift ships up and down like water elevators

Climb up to the bridge, peek inside the deckhouse where the crew lives, ride out a storm, and watch a pilot climb aboard while tugboats push the ship to the dock. Then meet three famous ships: the Ideal X of 1956, the Ever Given that got stuck in the Suez Canal, and MSC Irina, one of the biggest container ships ever built.

Inside you'll find:

• nearly 30 illustrations, with numbered parts that point to the pages that explain them
• Fact Bolts packed with real numbers
• a hands-on activity: the foil boat challenge
• a parts quiz, big questions and answers, and a glossary of 30 ship and port words

For curious readers ages 7 to 10 who love ships, big machines and finding out how things work. Book 3 in the Giant Machine Cutaways series.