What was the volume of material excavated during the construction of the Canal?
As of July 1, 1914, a total of 238,845,587 cubic yards of material had been excavated during the U.S. construction period. This volume, along with the 30,000,000 cubic yards excavated by the French, totals approximately 268,000,000 cubic yards, more than 4 times the volume originally estimated by Ferdinand de Lesseps for a sea level canal, and 3 times the volume excavated for the Suez Canal.
