MADRID, Spain – Builders of a massive, trouble-plagued expansion of the Panama Canal said Thursday they will make repairs after authorities there said it had sprung a leak.

PANAMA CITY – Water will start rushing into the newly expanded Panama Canal on Thursday in one area that was widened, ahead of the waterway's April 2016 re-inauguration.

In the latest setback for the behind-schedule, over-budget upgrade, a union representative said excavation work was on hold after negotiations broke down between the consortium and workers who have been on strike since Tuesday.

PANAMA CITY – A widened Panama Canal will be open for business in 2016 after a $400 million cash injection to help complete the long-delayed project was received, the waterway's chief administrator said Monday.

Experts hired by the Panama Canal Authority have identified remains of camels, crocodiles, the teeth of a giant shark, as well as bones of other animals millions of years old.

Some 14,000 ships and 280 million tons of merchandise cross the canal annually and five percent of world maritime traffic uses the Panama Canal.

Panama celebrated the 100th anniversary of its famous canal Friday with a ceremony and gala, even as it scrambled to make up lost time by enlarging it to maintain its competitiveness in the 21st century.

A two-week strike by workers expanding the Panama Canal has ended after they won wage increases, a union leader said Wednesday.

Work to expand the Panama Canal -- interrupted earlier this year for a dispute over cost overruns -- halted Wednesday, this time for a strike by workers demanding higher wages.

PANAMA CITY – A Spanish-led consortium resumed work Thursday to expand the Panama Canal, which handles five percent of global seaborne trade, after an acrimonious two-week stalemate over $1.6 billion in cost overruns.