Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge collapses

[Arizona Iced Tea]

https://twitter.com/CitizenFreePres/status/1772523215501369678

First world country with worse than third world infrastructure, what a joke.

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

I'm not exactly sure how you would design a bridge that could resist a cargo ship slamming into it, other than turning it into a causeway.

[Sestak]

Shades of what happened in Tampa in 1980. That one was a smaller section of the bridge, but also happened at a higher-traffic time. (7:30 in the morning). Hopefully casualties here were kept minimal.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Is the entire length of the bridge down? Crazy how it collapsed so fast.

[Sestak]

Is the entire length of the bridge down? Crazy how it collapsed so fast.

Seems to be the entire main span; the approaches appear intact at least on the initial footage.

[politicallefty]

I'm not exactly sure how you would design a bridge that could resist a cargo ship slamming into it, other than turning it into a causeway.

Looking at the video, it slammed right into one of the support towers. I can't say I've ever seen anything like it.

[Agafin]

I'm not exactly sure how you would design a bridge that could resist a cargo ship slamming into it, other than turning it into a causeway.

Looking at the video, it slammed right into one of the support towers. I can't say I've ever seen anything like it.

Yeah that was such an unlucky place for it to hit.

We can only hope that it happening so early (I believe it was 4 am?) when traffic should be lower, has led to few casualties. This is just horrible.

edit: It was actually 1:27 am ET.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

I'm not exactly sure how you would design a bridge that could resist a cargo ship slamming into it, other than turning it into a causeway.

Looking at the video, it slammed right into one of the support towers. I can't say I've ever seen anything like it.

The bridge predates current bridge construction standards it seems.

[quesaisje]

Shades of what happened in Tampa in 1980. That one was a smaller section of the bridge, but also happened at a higher-traffic time. (7:30 in the morning). Hopefully casualties here were kept minimal.

Biggest bridge collapse in the US since the Sunshine Skyway went down, according to early reports. Amazingly few reported casualties for something of that scale, but it was early and we'll see if those numbers hold up.

[politicallefty]

Shades of what happened in Tampa in 1980. That one was a smaller section of the bridge, but also happened at a higher-traffic time. (7:30 in the morning). Hopefully casualties here were kept minimal.

Biggest bridge collapse in the US since the Sunshine Skyway went down, according to early reports. Amazingly few reported casualties for something of that scale, but it was early and we'll see if those numbers hold up.

If it does, it'll be because it collapsed in the middle of the night. That makes a huge difference.

[Penn_Quaker_Girl]

The live cam footage is pretty horrifying.

And as others have said, the Sunshine Skyway collapse is the first thing that came to mind. 

[MasterJedi]

I’m sure they’ll find gross negligence and the shipping company will only get a slap on the wrist.

[Damocles]

There's probably a bunch of master schedulers, production planners, and demand managers who just got their phones pinged relentlessly with all sorts of alarms. After waking up and having some coffee and convening their teams, they're probably going to swear under their breath, attempt to contact their colleagues at the shipping line, and check on the status of their containers. They'll probably have to meet with senior management at some point to discuss the schedule disruptions and impact to customer orders. They'll probably have to do the same for their suppliers, too - all those shipments are gonna have to be rerouted, and all the project timelines just went to sh!t.

[GeorgiaModerate]

According to news reports, there was a plume of dark smoke from the ship and its lights were flickering shortly before it veered off course toward the bridge support.  Maybe it lost power.

[emailking]

2 people have been rescued from the water. 7 are still missing.

[Holmes]

That's really scary.

[Crumpets]

One consideration that's pretty minor now but could be a big deal in the coming days and weeks is that pretty much the whole Port of Baltlmore is on the other side of this bridge from Chesapeake Bay. So any boat going to or from Baltimore Harbor is probably stuck for the time being unless one of the spans is still up and stable at a bigger height than the boat. I'm sure they can find a workaround, but it won't be immediate like just getting cars to use the tunnel instead.

[Crumpets]

Just heard on the news that two people were found alive in the water and taken to the hospital.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

One consideration that's pretty minor now but could be a big deal in the coming days and weeks is that pretty much the whole Port of Baltlmore is on the other side of this bridge from Chesapeake Bay. So any boat going to or from Baltimore Harbor is probably stuck for the time being unless one of the spans is still up and stable at a bigger height than the boat. I'm sure they can find a workaround, but it won't be immediate like just getting cars to use the tunnel instead.

There's also apparently about 10,000 vehicles that cross the bridge daily.

[Benjamin Frank 2.0]

It sounds like the cargo ship wasn't supposed to go under the bridge, so, I don't know for certain, but here in British Columbia there have been multiple trucks (or specifically the cargo on the truck) that have crashed into overpasses in the past couple years.

It sounds like there could be an increasing problem with attempts to increase the amount of cargo per vehicle (whether on land or water, not sure about air) obviously to increase or maintain profits and the capacity of the present infrastructure to handle this attempted increase. That ship that got stuck in some harbor a couple years ago is another example of that.

Obviously the immediate concern is the life that is presently in danger.

[Crumpets]

WBAL broadcast:
- No distress call or mayday from the boat
- Crew is still on-board and in contact with Coast Guard

This is the stream I'm listening to if anyone's looking for live coverage:
https://www.youtube.com/live/3S6JWqEHNgY

EDIT: Sounds like the "no mayday" reports were false.

[dead0man]

the ship lost power twice, right before hitting the bridge.  Just watched a video on FB.  Not sure if the link will work here.

https://www.facebook.com/reel/429086342860624

[Sirius_]

I'm not exactly sure how you would design a bridge that could resist a cargo ship slamming into it, other than turning it into a causeway.

Looking at the video, it slammed right into one of the support towers. I can't say I've ever seen anything like it.

The bridge predates current bridge construction standards it seems.

I doubt this is in any building code

[dead0man]

yeah, it would be hard stupid expensive to design something that could absorb or resist that kind of energy

[GeorgiaModerate]

https://twitter.com/justin_fenton/status/1772629105881632880