First section of mangled steel removed
from collapsed Baltimore Key Bridge after
deadly ship crash: ‘Complicated process’
New York Post,
by
Patrick Reilly
Original Article
Posted By: ladydawgfan,
3/30/2024 10:11:51 PM
Engineers began carefully removing the first twisted hunk of steel from the collapsed part of Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge late Saturday, with the help of several massive cranes.
The nearly 50-year-old bridge crashed into the Patapsco River in Maryland on Tuesday, after a massive cargo ship smashed into one of its main supports, killing six construction workers and blocking shipping traffic into the Port of Baltimore.
Sparks could be seen flying from the mangled steel on Saturday as workers tried to cut part of the bridge off. Straps will be attached to the piece before it’s loaded onto a barge and taken away, Coast Guard officials said.
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Reply 1 - Posted by:
Skinnydip 3/30/2024 10:17:32 PM (No. 1689402)
When can we expect to hear why the ship lost power?
7 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
Dodge Boy 3/30/2024 10:38:36 PM (No. 1689415)
Uh NYP. Quick questions. Just wondering - did you find out why did the cargo ship crash into the bridge support structure? Bad weather? Who was the pilot and did he have an axe to grind? Pilot was a radical muslim from the mid-east by chance? A disgruntled dim voter? A mechanical malfunction on the ship? Come on, NYP. I know you know. Come clean, Patrick, please.
5 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
Gordon Mills 3/30/2024 11:25:24 PM (No. 1689431)
I'm impressed at how quickly they got busy with a herculean task.
5 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
bighambone 3/30/2024 11:29:13 PM (No. 1689433)
Regardless of what actually happened that caused the ship to hit and destroy the bridge, the immediate task now is to move all of what remains of the bridge structure that is blocking the main ship channel so that the harbor can reopen. After that a major investigation is in order.
7 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
WV.Hillbilly 3/30/2024 11:33:15 PM (No. 1689434)
Why not cut it away, put inflatable bags on it and tow it out to sea?
5 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
DVC 3/31/2024 12:08:53 AM (No. 1689445)
Good start, but a baby step. Going to take a whole heck of a lot more baby steps to get the channel cleared.
OK, is the replacement bridge already being designed, and designed in a way to be especially rapidly built?
Many LONG lead time special beam are likely to be required, and getting at least the bare bones design out so that the biggest and most special beams can get into at least planning for manufacture is critical if this bridge is to get back up soonest.
5 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Birddog 3/31/2024 3:49:09 AM (No. 1689469)
"Why not cut it away, put inflatable bags on it and tow it out to sea?"
Inflatable bags??? Like with CO2???? "Sacrilege"!!!!
Actually, inflatable bags, or tanks, or even sinking barges, then filling them with air would lift some of the sections,....but all of that steel is verrrrry valuable, We no longer make that grade of steel here. Though we do have mills that can recycle it still.
Bethlehem steel used to be in Baltimore, emplyed 30,000 people, enviro suits , regulations and Govt edicts about "Clean-up" from operations since 1888, made steel making "unprofitable' During Clinton's terms, the plant closed for good in 2012.
The Port of Baltimore is now a major Steel IMPORT location.
The channel is narrow and only 50ft deep, the rest of the Bay is shallows, and a long, long way from deep water ocean.
5 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
Strike3 3/31/2024 8:50:14 AM (No. 1689591)
Assigning a couple of tugboats to assist the ship through the bridge opening on the night it crashed would have been a lot less complicated and would have saved a few lives.
1 person likes this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
avital2 3/31/2024 9:04:49 AM (No. 1689616)
interesting to read that pilot saved a lot of lives w/his quick phone call to close the bridge. i think it was the pilot - or the captain now i'm a little vague. in any case it was quick thinking in such stressful circumstances.
2 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
DVC 3/31/2024 10:28:04 AM (No. 1689697)
That is a lot of high grade steel, they will want to recycle that, for certain. Disposing it "at sea" would take a lot more time, and be very wasteful. Lots of cutting with plasma cutters and acetylene torches and barges filled with lots of scrap, yet high grade, steel.
I hope that the design team is in place for the replacement bridge, they need to be working on the new design. Unless they copy the old design, very unlikely, it will take a good bit of time to get the DESIGN done, let alone get the bridge pieces made.
"We're burning daylight" get to work on it.
3 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
red1066 3/31/2024 12:03:32 PM (No. 1689783)
Traveled down I-95 on my way to church today. This was my first time to actually see the wreckage and the ship firsthand. It's an eerie site seeing the two portions of the highway sticking up in the air, and the ship and tangled mess. I've read several articles mentioning Francis Scott Key's history of owning slaves and the idea of not naming the new bridge after him. Anyone thinking along those lines can forget it. The new bridge will be named the Francis Scott Key bridge just as before. Key watched the bombardment of Fort McHenry from the location of the bridge which led to the lyrics for the national anthem. The people of Baltimore will have nothing to do with renaming the new bridge anything else but Francis Scott Key.
1 person likes this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
red1066 3/31/2024 12:06:24 PM (No. 1689786)
Sorry for the second post, but in response to #10's post. The process to replace the bridge was started the very next day after the collapse. Firms were notified to begin the process immediately.
1 person likes this.
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